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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/22653877">Tudo o Que Já Não É</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/RushAndTomatoJuice/pseuds/RushAndTomatoJuice'>RushAndTomatoJuice</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Lucifer Bingo 2019 [5]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Lucifer (TV)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Alternate Universe - Human, Alternate Universe - Spies &amp; Secret Agents, And a bit of fluff, Angst, Anxiety Attacks, BAMF Chloe Decker, BAMF Lucifer Morningstar (Lucifer TV), Beach Imagery, Betrayal, Blood and Violence, Canon Compliant, Canon-Typical Violence, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Feelings, Gen, Gun Violence, Human!Lucifer, Hurt Lucifer Morningstar (Lucifer TV), Hurt/Comfort, Injury, Lucifer Bingo 2019 (Lucifer TV), Lucifer Morningstar (Lucifer TV) is Bad at Feelings, Season/Series 02, heavy background story, lots and lots of feelings, prompt: demon, until certain point</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-02-10</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-02-10</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-18 01:48:56</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Mature</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Graphic Depictions Of Violence</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>38,719</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/22653877</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/RushAndTomatoJuice/pseuds/RushAndTomatoJuice</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Lucifer always knew that one day his past would come knocking on his door to destroy everything he’d built for himself. He’d just never expected that day to be today.</p><p>As he watched his brothers descend the main stairway in the precinct, he began feeling the flames of his past licking at his shins and taking over again, spreading and engulfing him whole. One second he was at the precinct, in the city where he’d been reborn, where he’d chosen to be, where he’d found his own family… in the next, he was back at where it had all started so many years ago...</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Chloe Decker/Lucifer Morningstar, Mazikeen &amp; Lucifer Morningstar (Lucifer TV)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Lucifer Bingo 2019 [5]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/1270544</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>27</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>171</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Collections:</b></td><td>LuciferBingo, catchingthewindfav</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Tudo o Que Já Não É</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>TITLE TRANSLATION: All That Is No Longer</p><p>The title comes from one of Fernando Pessoa's poems:<br/>"I love everything that was,<br/>Everything that is no longer,<br/>The pain that no longer hurts me,<br/>The ancient and erroneous faith,<br/>The yesterday that pain left,<br/>What left joy<br/>Just because it was, and flew<br/>And today is another day."</p><p>For the Lucifer Bingo 2019<br/>Prompt: Demon (it's a bit of a stretch but call it artistic license)</p><p><b> Beware of names changing throughout the story and how characters refer to themselves, especially Lucifer. It's important for this one. </b><br/>Heavy backstory in the beginning, I know, just bear with me :)</p><p>This has not been betaed.</p><p>Disclaimer: I own nothing but the plot.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Lucifer always knew that one day his past would come knocking on his door to destroy everything he’d built for himself. He’d just never expected that day to be today.</p><p>As he watched his brothers descend the main stairway in the precinct, he began feeling the flames of his past licking at his shins and taking over again, spreading and engulfing him whole. One second he was at the precinct, in the city where he’d been reborn, where he’d chosen to be, where he’d found his own family… in the next, he was back at where it had all started so many years ago...</p>
<hr/><p>If he closed his eyes and focused enough, Lucifer could still smell the smoke that had constricted his throat, feel the tears that had prickled his eyelashes and soaked his cheeks. He could feel the heat of the fire that had burned down his home and taken his parents away from him. </p><p>His twins and he were barely five when that had happened.</p><p>He’d always been maybe a bit too happy, adventurous and playful, extra cheerful despite everything, and just generally content, like it was expected of a child. But when his parents had died in that fire, some simple gas leak of all things, some part of him had died with them.</p><p>The orphanage his twins and he were forced into after the fire was the bitterest place in the entire world for him.</p><p>It was the place where he lost his younger twin, Gabriel. Not to a fire or to some certain end as death, but to something equally final to a five-year-old.</p><p>Gabriel had been given to another family. <em>Adopted</em>, as if he and his twins weren’t family enough.</p><p>In that orphanage, he’d been told countless times that he was too emotional or to pessimist for a five-year-old, too attached, too needy. Desperate for attention, too broody. <em>Dramatic</em>.</p><p>That he was a burden.</p><p>That he’d never get adopted because of that. That his twins would get a family and be happy, and he’d be left behind. </p><p>Like always.</p><p>The strangest thing was that that wasn’t how he’d used to see himself, at least not before it all burned to ash.</p><p>He’d told them they were <em>wrong</em>, that he <em>had</em> a family, tears bursting from his eyes as he tried to gulp down his emotions and prove them wrong. His voice wobbly as they scoffed and turned their backs to him. </p><p>Again.</p><p>It had only made him even more determined to prove them wrong. To show them he still had a family, brothers he cared about and that cared about him as well…</p><p>But his older twin got adopted shortly after Gabriel had... and he was left all alone again.</p><p>To this day, Lucifer had never felt as empty as he had that day. The day he’d been left behind. </p><p><em>Again</em>.</p><p>Now that he was an adult, looking back to his upbringing seemed even more painful. There wasn’t one point that had been the definitive time he’d changed. He’d began as a happy child, as happy as they all were, but after being left alone over and over again, a bitterness had grown into him, a void, and he’d been much too young to understand or try to fight against it.</p><p>He’d always been one for trouble and mischief, the playful sort in the beginning, but after being left behind by his parents and then both his brothers... his loathe for the orphanage and the people there only grew. He started getting into fights with the other children and scaring the people willing to adopt him. And when he was eleven, he didn’t miss the chance to run away from the place that had broken what was left of his family.</p><p>He’d been caught just a few hours later, too caught up on the newness and the openness and the bittersweet freedom of the world to notice he was being chased, and it was decided he’d be placed at a temporary home instead of going back to the orphanage. He was getting too old to be adopted, they’d said, and he was too much of a troublemaker.</p><p>No one would want him, anyway.</p><p>But being away from the orphanage hadn’t meant he’d behaved himself any better, and his troubling attitude had caused him to be ditched from temporary home to temporary home, until he finally worked up the courage and ran away again when he was thirteen.</p><p>He wasn’t caught this time. At least, not right away.</p><p>It was around then, when he was trying to survive on his own, that he ran into his older twin. But his twin wasn’t the brother he remembered. His twin’s new family had even changed his name – he was Michael now.</p><p>And he’d been so surprised and happy at first, that he hadn’t noticed that Michael wasn’t the brother he’d known.</p><p>Michael’s family had been surprised to meet someone so much alike their adopted son. And not simply because they looked exactly alike, despite the different hair color, but because he was able to match and even beat Michael in certain things.</p><p>He was just as clever, faster, taller, as good at all the games they made them play and compete. He was just as quick on his feet, not as strong as his well-nourished brother, but he was light and he could dodge, stealthily so, and that made him almost as good as his twin.</p><p>Their only difference was the lack of control he seemed to have over his emotions, and Michael’s new parents had said that would be his doom.</p><p>But after looking into him, checking with his old school, his temporary homes and the old orphanage, they decided to take him in as well. </p><p>He hadn’t known what he was getting himself into, he was just so happy he’d found his brother again that he’d said yes to this new life in front of him.</p><p>A life where he wouldn’t be alone anymore.</p><p>Amenadiel had come for Michael and him on their fourteenth birthday. He took them to the place Michael had been destined to all along, raised to, even. He, on the other hand, always knew that place would be the end of him.</p><p>They had been taken to ‘The Academy’, a secluded boarding school north of England, home to more than a few teens. He still had to take history classes, and math, and geography, and English, and it had felt like a normal school at first, but as his stay there grew, he began having to take self-defense classes that turned into proper fighting as he got older.</p><p>There was also some technology here, and some more exercising there, even some politics, and he knew, even before he’d become consciously aware of it, that he was being turned into a <em>thing</em>, a <em>weapon</em>, an object to serve someone else’s purposes. No prospects of a free future, no possibility for his own dreams or desires, he would be just a thing.</p><p>It came as no surprise that he was so undisciplined.</p><p>He’d been forced to detention more times than he could count, earning himself almost equally as much scars, both physical and mental.</p><p>But it was only at the end of his second year there that he really begun existing. In a ceremony much like a graduation, each of the teens who had survived their first two years were given a name. It was based on some angelic hierarchy, the ones with the most prominent futures got powerful, meaningful names, like his brother Michael who had been named after the most powerful Archangel, even before attending the place. </p><p>He’d gotten Samael, <em>the poison</em>, and had disliked it from the beginning. From the dreadful meaning, to the Angel it was associated with, – a forgotten shadow who once had been important, but was always the second best, the second choice – he had hated it from the moment it was given to him, but he didn’t fail to see its fitting.</p><p><em>They</em> were hardly ever wrong with the assigned names, after all.</p><p>At the end of the ceremony, he and his colleagues joined the Family. They were all brothers and sisters now, Samael had been told, and if he was lucky and obedient and a good son, he’d get to eventually join a selected few for the chance to meet their Father and leader.</p><p>He was nineteen when he and his siblings graduated from ‘The Academy’ and were assigned to their new posts, and at long last Samael figured out who owned him and what he had been turned into. They were assigned to Section 13, a forgotten division of the Military Intelligence Secretariat, responsible for unauthorized missions and ghost operations, working under everyone’s radar, nowhere and everywhere at the same time.</p><p>Samael never thought he would be cut out to be a spy, the thought had been nothing but one of his childish dreams, but as he worked and found his footing there, the job suited him far better than he was willing to admit. He’d quickly grown through the ranks, living up to his name and excelling in as many missions as his brother Michael had, but he had weaknesses his twin didn’t. </p><p>His love of freedom and his interest in the world beyond only grew as he was forced to blend in the shadows.</p><p>Samael knew there was more to life than just being the tool, the pawn on someone else’s work. He’d made it his personal task to slip through the other soldiers and escape into the real world as often as he could get away with it. There, he could finally enjoy the mountains of money MI13 was obligated to pay their spies, even if none of his siblings were mindful enough to do something with it. They were all too happy to just serve without knowing who or why, and letting the Family take care of all the rest, even if that meant forgoing control of their entire lives and their bank accounts.</p><p>They were spies first and foremost, and only then they were people.</p><p>That phrase, though, had never fitted him.</p><p>Samael had tweaked a bit with his money on the times he’d slipped into the real world. Some investments here and other bets there, and in a couple years he’d made himself a couple million pounds, and if he’d used secret information he’d gathered on his missions to know which stocks to invest on, it came by unnoticed. The money was part of his plan to freedom. He needed it to be sure he could tend to himself when he finally escaped <em>His</em> control, because Samael knew he eventually would.</p><p>It was just a matter of time.</p><p>Samael wasn’t at all pleased when he, Michael, Amenadiel and some other spies with Archangelic names got to meet their Father. After everything they’d heard from him, the spy to put even Sidney Reilly to shame, he was disappointed. For a man that called himself God, He was anything but.</p><p>They clashed from the beginning. Conflicting personalities, some of his siblings had guessed. Samael was only afraid they clashed because maybe they were much the same.</p><p>Father used to always argue with him, praise his siblings and frown upon his work, question his actions, his outcomes and his results. He was never proud of him, no matter how much Samael wanted him to be.</p><p>It really wasn’t a surprise to anyone when Father got physical with him, when he’d sport a black eye for a few days, or maybe a few cracked ribs. But for Samael, the last straw was when Father had found him in one of his slips to the real world.</p><p>Samael had always excelled in his studies and was an excellent self-taught student. Learning to play the piano had been his greatest achievement in all of his slips and his time before that. He’d learned it only from watching others play at a local theater and a few glimpses he’d gotten as a child. </p><p>But, apparently, playing the piano wasn’t a useful skill for an agent. At least Father didn’t think it was.</p><p>The day Father found him at the local piano bar, He broke three of his ‘less important fingers’ as He’d called them – the ones Samael didn’t need to shoot a gun or work a computer with – to teach him a lesson. His skills as a pianist had never been the same since then. Not that it mattered to the Family, since his shot remained as straight as ever.</p><p>The missions got even harder as the years flew by, and the time he had to plan his escape grew rarer. But with all the missions he’d carried through, all the information he’d gathered, all the lives he’d saved – and all the ones he’d taken –, Samael had made quite the name for himself.</p><p>He had heard some other day that some of the younger spies considered him but a legend, a myth. So, it was quite a surprise when a simple information gathering assignment turned his life into literal Hell.</p><p>It was a simple mission, really. He was to infiltrate a military complex, hack a few computers, copy the data and get out. He’d done that successfully countless times before, but this time, he didn’t know if someone had screwed up or if he’d been sold out, but this time the guards on the complex had been tipped off of his presence.</p><p>They came at him all at once, members of the ‘Underworld’, Britain’s most fierce rival in the silent espionage war. There were so many of them that Samael didn’t stand even the slightest chance, but it didn’t mean he’d go down without a fight.</p><p>He tried to stay up on his feet, to give back hits as much as he’d gotten, but in the end, they were just too many, and a sadistic grin was the last thing he saw before his world was forever plunged in darkness.</p><p>He’d been subjected to their torture for almost two and a half months. </p><p>Ten weeks of pure agony as they tried to get at least a nibble of information out of him, but not once had he said a word. There was no universe in which he betrayed his siblings, even if, for a second time in his life, he’d been left behind by them again.</p><p>Samael knew he was to be considered dead among his Family, and he knew it was the logical thing to do, but logic didn’t stop it from hurting and leaving a void inside his chest that possibly hurt even more than the torture itself.</p><p>He knew he was dead to them, so it had been quite the surprise when he’d been rescued from the hole.</p><p>The following year he’d been forced to spend between the hospital and his physical therapy sessions had been crueler to him than the torture itself. Samael just couldn’t accept how weak he had become, and just why his body wouldn’t do as he commanded. But the worst part was the scars, especially the twin crescent moons on his back. </p><p>Every time he was forced to acknowledge them, he was triggered to the moist darkness of his cell. The monstrosities on his back had been the result of his captor’s twisted sense of humor.</p><p>Command, as he was called, the head of Underworld, had thought that he didn’t deserve to be an angel anymore. He’d failed at his mission and was now forgotten by the others, renegaded, casted out, unranked and presumed dead, so he might as well have fallen.</p><p>They cut his back open at where wings would have sprouted from had they been real, so he’d know he would never fly again.</p><p>But fly he did. Walking out of his last physical therapy session, Samael was washed away with such relief that he smiled for the first time in too long. He knew he wasn’t cut out to be a spy any longer, and it should have been dreading and terrifying and final, but he was <em>happy</em>.</p><p>He was finally <em>free</em>.</p><p>After walking out of his Family and his job, and all the pain and heartbreak it had caused him over the years, Samael finally took control of his life. He started by buying a flat at downtown London to share with Maze, an interesting woman he’d met on his first slips and that was probably the only person who knew about his former secret life, and probably his only friend in the entire world.</p><p>He knew she worked as a bounty hunter and as a wrestler sometimes, but her past was as shady as his, and maybe that was why they’d been drawn to each other at the first place.</p><p>They’d been living in relative peace for a little over half a year before everything blew up, and quite literally this time.</p><p>A bomb went off inside their apartment, stunning Samael to an almost useless state as the flames took over his home for a second time in his life. </p><p>He’d only gotten back to himself once he’d felt the fire melting his clothes, making them stick to his skin and burning him. The wounds too real for it to be just his imagination.</p><p>It wasn’t the nightmare he kept reliving every time he closed his eyes. The flames were too real, real enough to scar his thigh, as fire burned his life to ashes for a second time.</p><p>It had turned common belief between Maze and him after the bombing attempt that it had been the Family’s doing. They probably hadn’t believed he hadn’t given up any of their secrets, and as it was, with him just as useless at defending himself now, he was probably a loose end in desperate need to be tied. Samael would pose as quite the threat to them were he to be captured again.</p><p>He wouldn’t be able to resist enhanced interrogation anymore, and after the bomb, he wouldn’t have a reason to.</p><p>Knowing their lives in London were ruined beyond repairing, Maze and Samael fled to the US. He knew the Family couldn’t kill them on US soil without a huge diplomatic mess with the Americans, so they were to be relatively safe for the first couple of months until they could come up with something better.</p><p>Moving to Los Angeles had been a no brainer. It held a deep contrast to London, warm and <em>bright</em> and happy and <em>alive</em> where London had been moist and dark. And it had the bonus of allowing him to live by the beach again.</p><p>He had always been secretly fascinated with it. It was the one thing that tied him back to his origin, his true life, from before he’d been turned into Samael, before the fire had burned his family away from him. </p><p>It was the only vivid memory he had of them, his real family – of his mother to be precise. </p><p>
  <em>He was too focused in building a sandcastle, so much so that he’d almost missed her smiling at him, the sweetest smile he’d ever seen. The sun was turning her light brown hair into a coppery gold, the wind blowing it back as the sea waves crashed behind her. </em>
</p><p>It was a memory of simpler times, happier times. When he felt safe and wanted and loved and free... it was from before he was burned to ash, before he had been made to forget all about it, before his training... it was from before he had been turned into Samael.</p><p>But he wasn’t Samael anymore. Not since he had been abandoned a third time.</p><p>From the very beginning, he had never liked his name, <em>the poison</em>, but, especially now, he couldn’t overlook how fitting it had turned out to be.</p><p>Now, he fully embraced his name, and the angel associated with it. Like the Archangel Samael, he, too, had been betrayed by his family, casted out, and vilified between his siblings. He had most certainly been painted a traitor to them, a threat to their Family. And just like his angelic counterpart, Samael had been stricken down, only to be reborn as something else.</p><p>Out of all his anger, all his hatred, and all his loneliness, Lucifer rose.</p><p>Once he and Maze began settling themselves in Los Angeles, they proceeded to become known throughout the city, and thus, impossible to be taken out without raising suspicion.</p><p>The first thing Lucifer did was get himself a beach house. A place he could keep hidden from everyone, where he could long for the life he’d lost as a child. But it was too much for him to actually live there. Too many fragmented memories, too many conflicting emotions, so, so many regrets.</p><p>Because of that, the club had been the perfect deal.</p><p>It served both their purpose for notoriety and tied Maze and him back to each other, to where they’d first met all those years ago in London. And the penthouse above turned out to be the perfect place for living.</p><p>Only a year after they’d fled London in fear for their lives, Maze and Lucifer were already an indispensable part of LA. He’d built himself an impressive network of people who owned him favors, had gathered thousands and thousands of patrons to his club, and collected the most extensive list of lovers. And in all the five years he’d spent trying to fill this void inside him after being abandoned by his family yet again, there was never a sign of them.</p><p>And it was what had worried him the most. He’d been forever vigilant in the beginning, always waiting for the other shoe to drop, for his siblings to come out of nowhere and ruin everything he had.</p><p>Always guarded, always waiting for the inevitable end to his happiness.</p><p>After a while, it had been easy to just ignore and forget. Forget he’d been an agent, forget all the monstrous things he’d done, all the monstrous things done to him. It began being easy to hide under his new persona.</p><p>Lucifer Morningstar, nightclub owner, playboy, womanizer, kind of a dick.</p><p>And he’d been, not exactly <em>happy</em>, Lucifer didn’t think he could ever be happy again, or that he ever deserved it... but he was content with where he was, what he did.</p><p>With how simple life could be.</p><p>But he’d never imagined he’d meet <em>her</em>.</p><p>Chloe Decker had been a factor he couldn’t have ever considered in his plans. And certainly, going back to a life on the job – even if the job here meant something astronomically different – was never something he’d imagined himself doing again.</p><p>He was reluctant at first, to use his skills again, to be back at fighting crime and chasing suspects and running for his life. Lucifer wasn’t cut out for that anymore, hadn’t been ever since the hole, but there was something about her that kept making him show up again and again, even when his every instinct told him to run the other way.</p><p>Some of their cases together were even worse than the ones he’d gotten as a spy. Being faced with the worst of the worst of humanity on a daily basis, it wasn’t kind to his mind. But thanks to that, and his blessedly oblivious therapist, Lucifer had discovered triggers he didn’t know he could have. And if in some cases he got to the truth a little faster or knew some details he couldn’t have gotten ahold of by himself or even if some of their criminals showed up at the precinct roughened up and willing to confess, Lucifer would just look the other way and feign ignorance. </p><p>But the hardest part of the job was not being in control. He couldn’t use the full extent of his skills without raising suspicion – without breaking his body and mind into a million pieces he wouldn’t be able to glue together again –, so he was forced to take a step back and do as he was told. </p><p>Lucifer had despised that idea at first, of willingly giving reign of himself and relinquishing control to someone else again, but there was something about the Detective, some underlying goodness and caring and genuine concern in her that had made him trust her since day one. Not blindly, he’d never give up his soul like his siblings had, but somehow, he knew she wouldn’t willingly betray him, not like his family had.</p><p>She made him feel safe for the first time in his life.</p><p>So, when Malcolm kidnapped her daughter, Lucifer hadn’t even had to think about using the full extent of his skills again. </p><p>It had been messy to say the least. As expected, his body didn’t move the way he remembered it could, and as a result, he’d gotten himself shot.</p><p>It had been a small grease to the side of his abdomen, his reflexes still fast enough for him to try to dodge the bullet. It had been the fact that he wasn’t expecting it at all that made him fall to the ground. The bullet, the pain, the sound of metal piercing skin, it all triggered him back to captivity and he’d been frozen on a growing puddle of his own blood for way too long.</p><p>Fortunately for him, and both his girls, he’d been quick in overcoming his fears just as the doctor had taught him to, and it all ended well with an awkward group hug while he tried to hide his injury from the Detective.</p><p>Things grew quiet after that.</p><p>Lucifer had kept his distance from the Detective in the first couple of days in an attempt to hide his injury and give it time to heal. She had seemed suspicious, and he didn’t doubt she could see right through his act, but fortunately she hadn’t pressed him for answers.</p><p>He’d gotten to the conclusion that maybe she didn’t really want to know, after all.</p><p>Their friendship grew closer in the months following the kidnapping and Lucifer had thought that maybe for once in his life he could actually be happy. </p><p>Until her freak accident.</p><p>It was safe to say he’d been paranoid after that. There was just no way it had been a simple accident. Deep down, Lucifer had always known his time in Los Angeles would come to an end, and he was ready to leave it all behind if it meant the Family would never harm his Detective. But it was all easier said than done.</p><p>Once the weeks passed and no one showed up to destroy his future, Lucifer allowed himself to relax and enjoy. Unfortunately, Dr. Carlisle hadn’t gotten that memo.</p><p>If Lucifer thought he’d known true pain and despair from his torturers, he was terribly and utterly wrong. No torture done to him had been more painful than watching his Detective in that hospital bed. </p><p>It had been the one time he’d allowed the darkness of his past to take control. With his spy set of abilities, he’d been able to track down Dr. Carlisle, and what had been destined for the doctor, well, he had named himself after the Devil for a reason.</p><p>He’d cured her, or helped doing so, and she was glad, and they were happy... but the memory of what he’d done to get the formula of the cure still hung in some dark corner in his mind.</p><p>It made him retreat into himself, hide from the world inside his penthouse, wishing he could run away.</p><p>To Vegas, maybe. It would’ve been so easy... </p><p>It was terrifying, how easily he’d given up control of his new self and retreated back into Samael for her. How easily he’d do anything for her. Risk his life, his sanity, even torture...</p><p>When he was alone, it was impossible to ignore the dark, but when she was around... it was all too good to be true.</p><p>She’d caught up with his weirdness, with his sudden retreat, and had somehow seen right through him. And it had helped, her silent support, more than he could ever admit.</p><p>And once again, when the dust had settled and he’d learned how to live with his actions, Lucifer had thought he could be happy.</p><p>His friendship with the Detective heading to an actual relationship, his circle of close friends expanding to even include the Douche, who maybe wasn’t such a douche after all. He had Ms. Lopez now and Doctor Linda, and even the Detective’s spawn...</p><p>Lucifer had two jobs he loved, where he could make a difference, be it arresting criminals or providing a safe place for people to enjoy themselves. He had real friends who didn’t want him just for what he could do, friends that maybe he could even call his family...</p><p>But in the end, it had, indeed, been too good to be true. The evidence of that in the form of his older twin, Michael, and his brother, Amenadiel, descending the stairs of the precinct, ready to destroy everything Lucifer had built for himself.</p>
<hr/><p>The beginning of his doom had started about two days before his brothers showed up, when the Detective and he had gotten a new case. </p><p>Lucifer had known there was something wrong with the crime scene even before he’d raised the yellow tape for her to duck beneath.</p><p>It was a typical homicide. Body had washed up on the shore at some rocky beach no one went to most of the time. There was no murder weapon, no suspecting evidence, no witnesses, no nothing. Except the victim was covered in cuts at all the right pressure points in the human body. Thin holes surrounded knees, ankles and elbows, and Ms. Lopez was fascinated by them, but they had rendered Lucifer practically immobile for a moment. </p><p>There wasn’t a single drop of blood in the body, and the forensics team hadn’t been able to determine cause of death, but Lucifer was too familiar with the MO.</p><p>His heartbeats spiked in a split second, leaving him lightheaded and out of breath, and too unfocused to do anything about it. His hands were trembling, enough for some officers to look at him twice, probably figuring he was hungover or in abstinence. </p><p>How he wished it was the case.</p><p>Lucifer shoved his hands inside his pockets, but there was nothing he could do to mask the fear taking over his features, taking over his being, his soul.</p><p>He just couldn’t tear his eyes away from what could have been his own ending.</p><p>He couldn’t help it, couldn’t stop it. Every time Lucifer looked at the young spy – because he <em>knew</em> the victim was a spy – dead on some unremarkable beach no one cared to remember about, he couldn’t stop picturing himself, the boy’s dead eyes were forever engraved into his mind.</p><p>The crime scene, the body, it was all becoming a bit too much for his limited grasp over his feelings, and so he left. No one seemed to miss his presence there, for which he was both thankful for and disappointed at, but there was no way Lucifer could have stayed there. The injuries and the torture and scene and – <em>it could have been him</em> – and, and, and- He just couldn’t, he <em>couldn’t</em> stay there and…</p><p>Breathe, he remembered. His breathing was getting out of control again, he knew. He closed his eyes and tried to remember the sound of the waves like the Doctor had told him to, but instead of waves all he could hear were his own hoarse screams.</p><p>He couldn’t do this, not again, not now. He was <em>drowning</em>, and <em>drowning</em>, and <em>drowning</em>, and-</p><p>“Hey, are you okay?”</p><p>And he could hear the waves again.</p>
<hr/><p>“Lucifer?” He heard the Detective’s voice calling him again and he opened his eyes, her fingers snapping right in front of him, but for a maddening second, he couldn’t see her. And then he couldn’t hear her anymore. He was underwater, the world was underwater and, and… “Earth to Lucifer, are you alright?”</p><p>“What?” Lucifer broke out from the spell his mind had settled him in in a flinch, and he could finally breathe again. He looked around, disoriented, not remembering when or how he’d gotten back to the precinct. A gentle weight on his shoulder brought his eyes back to the Detective. “Yes, yes.” He cleared his throat, the sound raspier than he’d like. “I am perfectly fine.”</p><p>“Are you sure?” The Detective asked again, her worried eyes never leaving him as she squeezed his shoulder and moved to sit on her chair. </p><p>Lucifer mumbled some sort of affirmative back at her and let his eyes drift to anywhere that wasn’t her. He knew she knew there was something going on with him, she always knew, and he was eternally glad she hadn’t pressed him about it.</p><p>He wasn’t prepared at all to deal with it himself, much less explain his irrational mind to her.</p><p>In the silence that grew around them, his anxiety slowly started to take control of his mind and it made it impossible for Lucifer to keep still for very long. His fingers started drumming on his legs, his feet tapping on the floor, even his eyes couldn’t stay still on the same thing for too long. </p><p>It had only been a couple hours since they’d returned from the crime scene, but he couldn’t stay there. He would only get in the Detective’s way as he was, he would be more of a liability than of any help.</p><p>So, he made his excuses and left, promptly ignoring the worry in her eyes as she watched him climb the stairs in a haste and disappear into the parking lot.</p><p>His driving back to Lux had been less than excellent. His attention span and his focus and his nerves were all going into overdrive, and it had made him almost crash into several other vehicles multiple times. He’d run more than a couple red lights and cut through every car on traffic he could. His only goal to finally be home.</p><p>Once he got to Lux, his hands were shaking so badly he could barely hold his phone up to his ear as it rung. </p><p>Lucifer took a deep breath and tried again.</p><p>He left the elevator the moment the doors opened to his penthouse, taking a gulp of fresh air as he tried to get the feeling of being enclosed out of his system. His heart was beating erratically inside his chest and he couldn’t breathe. His clothes were too tight and too warm, and he felt caged and he felt lightheaded and he had to hold himself on the bar counter to stop his legs from giving in and sending him stumbling down to the floor.</p><p>“What.” Came Maze’s voice from the phone laying scattered over the countertop, and Lucifer hadn’t even noticed he’d dropped it in the first place.</p><p>He jumped to catch it, almost losing his footing and falling to the ground again. “Maze! Maze, <em>Maze</em>. They’re back! They’re back and they’re here, and-” Lucifer tried to focus on the words leaving his own mouth, but he couldn’t. The world was spinning around him and he couldn’t hold onto it no longer. It was making him dizzy and nauseous and he almost lost his footing again. </p><p>“Lucifer calm down. Who’s here?” Her voice was cold from what he could hear through the speaker, and for a second that had been the most important detail in the entire world to him.</p><p>Lucifer blinked hard, an effort in vain to stop his mind from swirling around and blacking out entirely. “<em>Command</em>.” he whispered to the phone, still afraid of saying it out loud. The mere mention of the name made his entire body chill, the darkness of the hole threatening to engulf him whole.</p><p>Lucifer let the phone drop to the counter in a loud clank. He could hear Maze calling him over the speaker, but he was too deep inside his own fears to care. He made his way to the bathroom in wobbly legs and stopped just before the sink.</p><p>Flashes began to take over his mind as his soulless eyes stared right back at him on the mirror. His own screams were all he could hear, ringing loudly inside his brain. Brief flashes of him followed next, all with varying amounts of blood, different injuries, different lighting, but always the same pain. </p><p>The flashes were barely a second long, but Lucifer could feel it slowly driving him insane.</p><p>His brown eyes focused back on themselves through the mirror, his mind long lost to his suffering. His reflection was as far away from Lucifer Morningstar as he’d ever been. He looked pale, fragile, weak, his hair was askew, his eyes devoid of emotion, unseeing – just like the victim’s had been.</p><p>His hand reached to the gauntlet on its own, the water that started running from the tap helped him get back a little sense of balance and control, but the feeling was too little in the perfect storm that was taking over his consciousness. Lucifer closed the gauntlet before the water could overflow out of the sink and lowered his eyes to stare at it.</p><p>Then, he submerged his face and screamed his throat raw.</p>
<hr/><p>The reverberating boom of thunder made Lucifer escape from the dark that had plagued his nightmares to an even darker reality, a piercing scream breaking out of his throat as he came to be. Water blurred his vision when he tried to open his eyes, and that same water covered his nose and mouth and for a terrible, <em>terrible</em> second, still absorbed by residual panic from his memories of torture, Lucifer couldn’t breathe.</p><p>He quickly ran a hand over his face to send the water away, but the choked gasp of air sent it down the wrong pipe in his throat and he almost coughed the life out of him as a result. Lucifer tried to raise himself in one swift motion, but his arm that had come to support him slipped on the wet floor and he fell, his head hitting the cold marble with a sickening crack.</p><p>Another thunder made the sky tremble and his body and consciousness along with it.</p><p>Lucifer was slow in rising this time, using one forearm to support him and the other hand to shield his eyes from the pouring rain.</p><p>He looked around, confused, distressed at finding himself sleeping outside on the balcony floor as the sky poured down in LA. </p><p>The sky was crashing. Heavy rain was falling from angry, grey clouds, thunders hitting the ground every so often. The glass doors of his balcony were open, letting the cold rain inside, and it was that thought that shook him the most.</p><p>Lucifer stood carefully this time, slowly to avoid slipping again, and to not disturb the monstrosities in his back. He was dripping wet, his boxers clinging to his form in their damp state, his skin paler than it had ever been and he was shaking from the cold, his teeth were clamming together, and he just couldn’t keep his hands still. He trembled and he hurt and he needed to get out of there.</p><p>He turned around just as another thunder hit LA and it made him flinch, visible and painful and terrible. Lucifer shook his head and walked back inside, shutting the glass doors behind himself. </p><p>He was in captivity no more.</p>
<hr/><p>When he walked into the precinct the following morning and all eyes turned his way, Lucifer hadn’t even tried to fool himself that it was just his natural magnetism in play.</p><p>It had been impossible for him to sleep after waking up outside in the rain, and it showed in his appearance. His hair wasn’t in its groomed perfection, with a few wayward curls slipping out of the gel here and there, his stubble was maybe a day too big, his shirt hadn’t been carefully tucked in, and the purple beneath his eyes was still noticeable even after he’d applied makeup.</p><p>Lucifer had tried to go back to sleep after waking up in the rain and the obnoxiously long shower he took to get himself warm again, but his bed had felt too soft, like the mattress would swallow him whole. He’d paced the apartment after that, checking around for bugs and hidden cameras. He’d checked his hidden guns, just in case he’d have to fight his way out of this coming mess. After that, he’d just resorted to drinking to calm his nerves.</p><p>The scars on his back hadn’t stopped bothering him ever since he’d woken up from his nightmare. They pulled depending on the way he turned his body, the material of his shirts and even his silk sheets had scratched at the sensitive skin there, and he’d had to dodge more than a few officers that were aiming to pat him on the back on his way in.</p><p>Lucifer made his way to the Detective’s empty desk in slow strides, dreading having to sit down on a chair. He was careful not to hurt his back with the backrest, but there was only so much comfort he could get leaning away from the chair.</p><p>He was left alone with his thoughts for quite some time, a prospect which pleased him and dreaded him at the same time. Surprisingly, in the light of day, in a place as familiar as the precinct, and somewhere that reminded him so much of his Detective... his dark memories were easy to keep away.</p><p>“Hey, Ella wants to see you in her lab.” The Detective suddenly called from behind him, and it made Lucifer startle. He turned around faster than he should’ve, and the movement strained his scars enough to make him hiss in pain. Lucifer closed his eyes to stop new tears from prickling at his eyelashes, but there was only so much he could do to will the pain away.</p><p>When he opened his eyes, he noticed the Detective’s were all over him. They drifted from his askew clothes to his ungroomed hair and stubble to the purple bags hanging heavy beneath his eyes. Her hand twitched at her side as if she wanted to reach out to touch him but wasn’t sure if it’d be welcome. </p><p>It would, very much so... </p><p>Lucifer could see it in her eyes, feel her concern, her want to ask what happened and help, and he was immensely glad she decided not to.</p><p>“Could you maybe get me some coffee first? I’ll meet you in the lab.” </p><p>He let out a sigh, the beginnings of a smile pulling at the corner of his lips. “Of course.” Lucifer said as he slowly got up from the chair. Coffee would be great. The smell was engraved in his mind in such a deep association with his Detective, that it had always worked on calming him down from his escalating madness.</p><p>He headed to the breakroom for the coffee, thanking his stars all the way that she hadn’t pressed him for answers. He knew she would wait for him to tell her on his own, and Lucifer wished he could, but it would put her in danger.</p><p>His past always did. </p><p>Maybe just as much danger as his mere presence around her was putting her. If their killer were to find of his connections to her…</p><p>Lucifer gulped down the doubt and willed himself to focus on getting coffee. It was probably a good thing for him to stick around her, seeing as he knew more about their murderer than anyone else in the LAPD. Yes, of course it was.</p><p>He let out a pained breath as he watched the coffee pour down at two mugs. The watery smell of that brownish <em>thing</em> officers called coffee filled his nostrils and made him nauseous.</p><p>His stomach had been much too sensitive since he’d woken up in the rain. Lucifer had tried to convince himself his fears were only in his mind, but his subconscious had been adamant in making his body think he was still being held against his will, and that was showing from his looks to his stomach, to his nerves. </p><p>Lucifer picked up both mugs forgoing the handle. The heat seeped through the ceramic and into his palms and he concentrated on imagining it consuming all the cold out of his bones. The mugs were hot enough to burn his hands, but Lucifer soldiered through, using the pain to ground him to the now. </p><p>That was another problem he was having, separating the world from his memories. Sometimes they looked too much alike, sometimes they were so contrasting he couldn’t tell which one was which.</p><p>But pain helped, and the excessive heat from the mugs was helping now.</p><p>He was walking back to the Detective, his mind finally focused on something that wasn’t the inevitable future attempt on his life or the wreaking memories of his dark past, when it all came crashing down. </p><p>At first, he had hoped it was just a memory, that somehow his mind had slipped away from reality, but the heat from the coffee mugs never stopped burning.</p><p>“Lucifer?” He heard the Detective call for him, and he realized he must have been standing frozen in place outside the lab for longer than he should have, but even though he knew he should move, turn away, forget what he was seeing... he couldn’t.</p><p>Lucifer heard footsteps approaching him, but they echoed and mingled with the ones eating down the steps in the main stairs and it was too much trouble to focus, reality and memories and fears all fusing together in one horrible nightmare.</p><p>“What’s wrong?” The Detective asked, her voice just as soft as the hand she placed on his arm.</p><p>Lucifer flinched so badly in response to her touch that he almost dropped both mugs to the floor. His sudden movement made coffee spill in his hands, but the burns barely hurt. It was nothing compared to the pain of reality.</p><p>He looked at his Detective, his eyes lost, his mind still engrossed in the end of him. He tried to speak, but all words were stuck inside his throat, forming a ball that constricted his airway. Lucifer’s eyes returned to the two long forgotten faces approaching him almost on autopilot, his mind still lost as to what to do, his body completely frozen. </p><p>He heard the Detective take a surprise gasp by his side once she noticed his brothers and his breathing began speeding up. He’d really turn out to be putting her in danger, after all. </p><p>“Detective Decker? I’m Agent Firstborn.” Amenadiel introduced himself as he approached them, taking out his - fake - Interpol badge, offering his hand for her to shake with a plastic smile. Michael did the same. “This is Agent Demiurgos. We’re here for your John Doe case. Interpol will be handling it now.”</p><p>“Excuse me?” The Detective replied, indignant, leaving Michael’s hand hanging in the air. </p><p>Had it been any other situation, it would’ve made his day. Someone leaving Michael hanging, openly arguing with Amenadiel, directly and rightfully standing up to them, but this time it made him drown in dread.</p><p>Their argument continued for long minutes, the Detective fighting for their case while his brothers lied and tried to pull a rank they didn’t have to take the case from them, but Lucifer’s mind had stopped paying attention a long time ago. </p><p>In that moment, all he could think about was the bomb that had made Maze and him run from London and his brothers’ faces when they’d rescued him from hell only to put him through another. </p><p>Lucifer was beginning to lose control of his breathing to fear. His heart hammered madly against his chest, making his head go light. It was slightly terrifying how he could be aware of his panicking but couldn’t do anything to stop it.</p><p>But his fear had stayed at a manageable level, and it would’ve remained that way, hadn’t Michael, his twin, - who looked <em>exactly</em> like him - set his eyes on him. </p><p>“Sam.” Michael said, his voice as it always used to be. Blank and direct and somewhat commanding, but familiar all the same. It had Lucifer’s mind spinning around from panic, ice cold fear running through his veins. His fight or flight response was a mess, telling him to run for his life while also gluing him to the spot. “Sam?” Michael tried again, and this time Lucifer forced his eyes to meet his.</p><p>“What?!” He spat, attracting three startled pairs of eyes to himself. It made his hands start trembling, not enough to be noticeable by the others, but enough for the mugs to become too heavy for him to keep holding them for long. “Don’t you have work to do?” Lucifer asked his brothers, taking a step back and lowering his gaze to appear as unimportant and invisible as he could. </p><p>The Detective chased them out of the precinct without the case a few minutes later. She cupped his elbow and slowly led him inside the lab, taking the mugs from his hands and placing them on the center table.</p><p>Lucifer let out a wavering sigh and leaned his forearms on the table before dropping his head, trying to control the trembling of his hands. It was just too much all at once, too many memories, too much uncertainty, too much pain... so, so much doubt and fear and betrayals and hurt…</p><p>“So... <em>Sam</em>...” Daniel began from some place in the lab, but Lucifer couldn’t care less for his tentative friend. He was too focused on calming his stomach and preventing himself from retching all the alcohol he’d consumed for breakfast. “<em>Samuel</em>.” Daniel continued, circling him and leaning beside him on the table, pointedly ignoring the Detective’s, not so secret, glances. “Man, I <em>knew</em> you had a common name!” </p><p>On a second, Lucifer was slowing his breathing, his eyes focused on the fluorescent lights from the forensics table, on the next, he felt the Douche’s hand connect to his back in a mind numbingly slap and saw stars.</p><p>His knees gave in, his legs too weak to keep him up, and Lucifer barely supported himself with his forearms on the table before he could fall to the ground, the pain on his back so blinding, he almost passed out from it. It made his stomach churn, and it took all his efforts to keep the alcohol inside his stomach.</p><p>The Detective’s harsh tone as she scolded the Douche barely broke through the buzzing that filled his mind, the slap reverberating inside his skull. The pounding of his heart was so loud in is ears, that the sound of his friends around him faded into silence, until Lucifer could only hear his own panic.</p><p>He could only recognize the shallow, disorienting wheezes of his desperate gasps, and for a maddening moment that stretched for far too long, Lucifer didn’t know where he was.</p><p>The Hole was the only logical place for him to be in. Every time he tried to open his eyes all he could see was a hazy darkness engulfing him whole. He felt surrounded by ice, an unrelenting cold that was seeping into his bones, coating him in impenetrable terror. And his back…</p><p>Only Command could’ve done that to him. So, the Hole, it was only logical.</p><p>But then he felt her touch, and Lucifer wasn’t so sure anymore.</p><p>Strong hands came to grip at his biceps, warm hands, careful hands, gentle despite their strength... the Detective’s hands. She helped him back to his feet, but he still couldn’t open his eyes.</p><p>Lucifer tried to focus on her hands on his arm, on the heat of her palms, on how gentle and strong they were at the same time. And her touch seemed like a light in the midst of the dark cell that had once again filled his mind’s eye. </p><p>But her light was too dim, and <em>Command</em> invaded his mind again. The sound of his skin being cut open still haunted him, and the smell of blood and burnt flesh clung to his nostrils, making Lucifer want to empty the contents of his stomach again. </p><p>Flashes of the deceased, tortured spy began haunting his awake nightmare, and all Lucifer could hear were his own hoarse screams. And then the world was spinning around him again and it kept getting harder and harder to hold onto the table and <em>that could have been him</em> and...</p><p>And he felt as if he was going to pass out for a minute, but the Detective’s grip got firmer on his arm. It was a reassuring type of strength, made to support, not break or harm, and so, so… <em>her</em>.</p><p>It was such an odd gesture in his experience that Lucifer couldn’t ignore it, couldn’t force his thoughts away from it, from trying to figure out what it was, why she was doing it, <em>why it got such an profound response on him</em>... that her light grew in his mind, and the dark was banished to the abyss of his consciousness. </p><p>When Lucifer finally got a reign over himself and opened his eyes, he felt the weight of the stares and he couldn’t bring himself to face his friends, not when he felt so raw from emotion and tired out of his mind.</p><p>So, he resorted to anger. Simple emotions, far easier to control, easier to understand, easier to feel. “It’s <em>Samael</em>.” He gritted out, spitting the word at the Douche with poison dripping from his tone. Lucifer hated himself for correcting Daniel – Samael wasn’t who he was anymore, hadn’t been for a long time – but the will to do so was stronger than him, and the words were spilling out of his lips before he could stop them. </p><p>Lucifer cleared his throat, hating how his voice had sounded so hoarse, and properly got back to his feet. If the wide eyes his friends were sporting had anything to say, they were as surprised with his outburst as he was. “I have to go.” He excused himself, straightened the invisible wrinkles on his suit and marched out of the precinct on wobbly legs.</p>
<hr/><p>Lucifer blinked repeatedly, his thumbs pressing to his eye sockets to forcefully push the pain away. If only it would help... </p><p>He’d been staring at the unmoving doors of the penthouse elevator nonstop since he’d woken up from a suspicious noise in the middle of the night, and with every passing second, he felt himself nearing the point of insanity.</p><p>It had been two days since his brothers had shown up at the precinct, and since then, Lucifer hadn’t heard a single word from them. It was making him paranoid at this point, this unending wait. Because Lucifer knew that, sooner or later, they’d come for him. </p><p>Later in this case, as it seemed. It was clear to him that they were aiming at wearing him out. Win by making him so tired and unfit to defend himself that he’d be unable to fight back. And if that was the case, he had already lost. </p><p>Lucifer hadn’t been able to properly shut his eyes to rest since he’d seen them, since he’d heard their steps coming down the precinct stairs. He’d forced himself to stay awake and watch, make sure he’d be ready for when they inevitably attacked, and it was wearing him down fast.</p><p>Of course, he was also avoiding sleep so he wouldn’t have to dream. A dark cell was waiting for him every time he closed his eyes.</p><p>To say Lucifer was stressed, all things considered, was a big understatement. He hadn’t properly shaved in days and his stubble had grown to the beginnings of a full beard. He hadn’t bothered much with his appearance, sticking to lightweight and stretching-friendly clothes only for when his brothers showed up. Makeup had been left untouched, as had his hair gel and comb for that matter.</p><p>Lucifer had spent his days lurking on different places on the penthouse, all of them with clear sight to his elevator. And all the hours he spent watching the damned thing keep still were hours he knew he was getting closer and closer to losing his mind.</p><p>His phone had beeped nonstop on the first night, after he’d left the precinct. The Detective kept asking him how he was and Lucifer kept ignoring every text. He hadn’t bothered to show up at the station, afraid he’d be putting her in even more danger because of his presence, and afraid of how she’d react to his new – but completely reasonable – paranoia, but somehow, he always managed to keep his phone charged. Even if he only ignored her texts, it still seemed like a bubble of fresh air every time he got a new one.</p><p>That was the reason why Lucifer knew something was wrong. There were maybe only a couple hours or something left to the end of the Detective’s shift, and his phone hadn’t beeped at all that day.</p><p>Lucifer was getting increasingly worried, on top of everything else, about her wellbeing. It had crossed his mind on more than one occasion that he’d caused this, that if she was in danger, it was because of him. That his brothers had taken her to get to him. Lucifer had tried to push those thoughts away – maybe she was just busy, or maybe she was tired of trying to reach him, since he never texted back – but doubt was nothing if not persistent.</p><p>Eventually, he forced himself to pick up the phone and check the messages. As much as reading them made him feel lighter, it also weighed heavy on his consciousness.</p>
<p></p><div>
  <p>
    <em> Tuesday</em>
  </p>
</div><em> The Detective: Are you okay? </em><div>
  <p>
    <em> 4:08PM</em>
  </p>
</div><em> The Detective: Is your back still hurting? </em><br/><em> The Detective: I’m worried about you. </em><br/><em> The Detective: Lucifer. </em><br/><em> The Detective: Are you okay? </em><div>
  <p>
    <em> 5:13PM</em>
  </p>
</div><em> The Detective: My shift ended early. </em><br/><em> The Detective: You want some company? </em><div>
  <p>
    <em> 7:35PM</em>
  </p>
</div><em> The Detective: Are you sleeping? </em><br/><em> The Detective: It didn’t seem like you were sleeping well enough. </em><div>
  <p>
    <em> 9:55PM</em>
  </p>
</div><em> The Detective: Lucifer? </em><div>
  <p>
    <em> 11:34PM</em>
  </p>
</div><div>
  <p>
    <em> Yesterday</em>
  </p>
</div><em> The Detective: Are you getting my texts? </em><br/><em> The Detective: I just want to know if you’re okay. </em><div>
  <p>
    <em> 7:54AM</em>
  </p>
</div><em> The Detective: Maze said you haven’t gotten out of the penthouse yet. </em><br/><em> The Detective: And that no one has gone up. </em><br/><em> The Detective: Are you okay? </em><div>
  <p>
    <em> 11:21AM</em>
  </p>
</div><em> The Detective: I called Linda, and she said you missed your appointment, but wouldn’t say more than that. </em><br/><em> The Detective: You never miss your appointments. </em><div>
  <p>
    <em> 2:12PM</em>
  </p>
</div><em> The Detective: Can you tell me if you’re sleeping at least? </em><br/><em> The Detective: I can stop by if it’ll help you rest. </em><br/><em> The Detective: Or you can come over if you want. </em><br/><em> The Detective: The couch is free. </em><div>
  <p>
    <em> 7:03PM</em>
  </p>
</div><em> The Detective: Please, Lucifer. </em><br/><em> The Detective: Just let me know if you’re okay. </em><br/><em> The Detective: Please. </em><div>
  <p>
    <em> 10:32PM</em>
  </p>
</div><div>
  <p>
    <em> Today</em>
  </p>
</div><em> The Detective: Lucifer? </em><div>
  <p>
    <em> 01:37AM</em>
  </p>
</div>Lucifer dropped the phone back to the counter, the device clinking as it hit the stone surface. He lowered his head to his hands, shame eating up at his guts as he felt bile rising up his throat.<p>He’d made her worry over him again.</p><p>He let out a sigh and allowed the defeat to wash over him. Lucifer thought about answering her, but what could he say at the moment? That he was alright? Or that he was sleeping well? That his back didn’t hurt anymore?</p><p>That he was <em>okay</em>?</p><p>How could he say any of those things to her – the very same things that would ease her worry – when none of them were true?</p><p>He hadn’t slept properly in days, his breath was stinking of scotch, and he hadn’t even bothered to comb his hair or shave or even shower properly. He’d occasionally avoid shirts since they felt like sandpaper on his scars, and more often than not triggered him back to the dark. He hadn’t been eating, hadn’t been cleaning, hadn’t been thinking beyond that elevator.</p><p>Lucifer wasn’t fit to leave the penthouse, much less to go see her. She deserved so much better than him at this state, but at least she could see he’d finally checked her messages. It was a start.</p><p>He was staring at the black screen mirroring his suffering from where it sat on the counter when it beeped to life, and Lucifer practically jumped to catch it. He vibrated with the new text, both relieved the Detective was okay and ashamed at another text that would go unanswered. </p><p> </p><p>
  <em>The Detective: We have a lead.</em>
</p><p> </p><p>Four words, no hidden meanings, no secret agendas, no games to be played. It was as simple as that, <em>she had a lead</em>, and yet it made him freeze. </p><p>Lucifer wasn’t sure on how to proceed. There weren’t exactly guides on ‘what to say to your partner after disappearing for a couple of days’ to help him in this situation. His fingers halted above the screen as he was about to type in a reply – what, he didn’t know exactly. Lucifer just knew he was about to.</p><p>
  <em>Should he stay or should he go?</em>
</p><p>That simple thought pushed his mind into a memory, one of the best he had. Of when the Detective had saved Lux and he’d dragged her to dance with him, of how good and peaceful it had felt, how good they’d felt together. How calming it had been, how happy <em>he</em> had been. </p><p>It was enough to send the dark away long enough for Lucifer to overcome his paranoia and decide in favor of her.</p><p>But, unfortunately, it didn’t stay away for very long. Just as Lucifer was about to type in his reply, he remembered exactly why he was staying away. Leaving the penthouse, his safe place, would be exactly what his siblings would want him to do. Take him out in an open environment would be easier, especially since he was used to the penthouse and they weren’t.</p><p>And using the Detective as bait would be the perfect set up. And even if his brothers weren’t behind this one, he’d still be putting the Detective in harm’s way were he to be found by Command.</p><p>But if it was a trap, then maybe they already had her. </p><p>The realization made Lucifer’s heart race, madly hammering against his ribcage and sending him down a very controlled terror spiral. He felt as if his heart was going explode out of his chest at any given second.</p><p>If the Detective had been taken, it was his duty to get her back, his responsibility to her. And if they hadn’t taken her yet, they might be planning to, and it would be best if he were there to interfere with, to help her protect herself. And since his brothers were also working the case, it really was in his best interest to be there.</p><p>Yes, it was.</p><p>Lucifer nodded to himself and typed a quick reply. He forced his feet to move to the closet, so he’d at least make himself presentable. <em>It was the right choice</em>, he repeated to himself all the way as he got ready, hoping beyond hope that he’d come to believe it.</p><p>
  <em>It was the right choice.</em>
</p>
<hr/><p>Ever since his arrival at the precinct and the quick briefing he’d gotten from the Detective, she hadn’t said a word to him, and she hadn’t gotten one from him in return. Lucifer was beyond relieved when he descended the stairs to find her peacefully working on her desk. His relief was such, that he’d physically felt lighter at the sight of her, glowing in the early sunset light.</p><p>He could tell the Detective had noticed his less kept appearance – she always did – but neither she nor Daniel mentioned it. It was a bit unnerving, waiting for their questions. The silence didn’t stop Daniel from pointedly staring at the bags beneath Lucifer’s eyes, or quietly inquiring about his slightly askew clothes. </p><p>The Detective, on the other hand, kept her eyes away from him at all the times she could.</p><p>The excess of staring, the lack of staring, and the overall quietness made for the tensest car ride Lucifer had been on in years.</p><p>He’d been wired for the entire way, overly checking all corners the Detective had to stop and all people and possible sniper-friendly buildings they passed by. By the time they’d arrived at the warehouse the supposed lead was in, Lucifer was almost shaking from being still for too long.</p><p>The Detective approached him when they left the car, no doubt having noticed his nervous jitters setting in. “Are you okay?” She asked, easily falling into step beside him as they walked towards the entrance.</p><p>Lucifer let out a sigh as he worked on what to say to her that would be the truth but would prevent him from worrying her even further. In the end, he chose a simple “Of course, Detective.”</p><p>While rather simplistic, it was the truth. He was alright, at that particular moment in time.</p><p>The Detective placed a hand on his forearm, making him halt on his steps. Her blue eyes zeroed in on him on their own accord for the first time that day, and they made him feel uneasy, a chill running all the way down his spine. The hollow void behind his breastbone was worsened by the worry in her gaze, and it made it harder for him to breathe.</p><p>Lucifer worked his mouth to form a reply, but the words were stuck in his throat. How could he say what was troubling him, how could he say he wasn’t okay, how could he make her <em>understand</em> when… How could he say any of that without putting her in even greater danger?</p><p>His focus on the world surrounding him started thinning as Lucifer remembered just what he was debating telling her. The edges of his vision started fading into black, his breathing was picking up its pace, the dark from his worst nightmares hanging over his head.</p><p>“Lucifer…” The Detective whispered his name, the hand in his arm growing supportive. It was – <em>she</em> was – a beacon amidst the thunderstorm wreaking havoc inside his mind, and Lucifer began to see the light of day again.</p><p>“Detective, I-” He forced himself to speak, his voice rasping in his throat. Lucifer had been trying to form coherent words again, drawn by the support he recognized in her, when a crash inside startled them out of their bubble and back into the moment.</p><p>Both he and the detectives sprang into action, running inside the warehouse, where they were met with only darkness. Lucifer’s heart stopped beating for a second when he was engulfed by the dark, his mind still trapped in the past.</p><p>“What the hell!” Daniel exclaimed, making Lucifer flinch. He heard two clicks not a few seconds later and two light spots surged amidst the dark. “What is this place?” Daniel asked as they began to explore.</p><p>Lucifer disregarded both detectives and their ramblings as they walked further inside the metal house, his inner alarms going off like crazy. </p><p>“What was the lead, Detective?” Lucifer asked, jumping into their conversation. The further center they walked, the easier it became to see, with two skylights letting in the sunset.</p><p>“What do you mean?” She asked back, turning her flashlight off since it was doing little to help now with the new light. </p><p>“How did you get the lead?” He asked, fearing the answer. If he was right, and Lucifer really hoped he wasn’t, they were in serious trouble.</p><p>“Anonymous tip, why?” It was Daniel who answered, his mind still oblivious to what Lucifer saw dawning on the Detective’s face. What he now knew to be right.</p><p>Anonymous tip, dark warehouse in the outskirts of the city, away from people who might hear what was happening inside… And just when he knew there were spies after him. Not even wishful thinking could get them out of this one now.</p><p>“It’s a trap.” The Detective voiced his worries in a whisper, and not even a second later, a bullet flew through the air, just a few inches away from them, and hit a metal crate, making a sound that reverberated around the entire warehouse.</p><p>“Fuck!” Daniel cursed as they threw themselves at the ground to take cover. </p><p>Both detectives drew their weapons and readied themselves for open confrontation. The gesture made Lucifer’s hands tingle with a need to hold deadly metal as well, an urge he hadn’t felt in ages. It really was bad preparation on his part not to bring a weapon for himself, but with the Detective’s keen eyes, he would never get away with it.</p><p>“Yoo-hoo. Come out, come out, wherever you are.” A sickly tone rang around them, cutting through the air much like the bullets had just a second ago. The metal walls only made it seem louder, and Lucifer felt Daniel tensing by his side in response.</p><p>It would be damn near impossible for him to pinpoint where their would-be murderer was – and even if there was more than one – but it wasn’t impossible for Samael. He’d done this before, he’d had missions against these minions, he knew how they operated...</p><p>It wouldn’t be impossible; it would only take some precious time Lucifer wasn’t sure they had.</p><p>It would take time and some of the set of skills he’d wished he’d forgotten.</p><p>Despite being focused on the direst situation at the moment – which was to get both himself and the detectives out of this warehouse alive – Daniel moving at his side didn’t escape Lucifer’s attention. His eyes were back at the Douche in seconds, already knowing what he was planning to do.</p><p>“<em>Are you mental?</em> You can’t simply shoot at them!” Lucifer shout-whispered at him, pushing him back behind the crate they were hiding. “Have you not noticed we are surrounded by metal? The bullets might ricochet back to us.”</p><p>“Well, that’s not stopping <em>them</em>.” Daniel tried to justify himself in a tone louder than Lucifer would like, but it went under the radar as more bullets hit the metal surfaces around them making all three of them flinch.</p><p>Lucifer fixed him with a deathly glare, daring him to try and make reasons when the Detective intervened. “He’s right, Dan. We can’t risk it.” She argued, loosening her tight grip on her weapon.</p><p>Lucifer watched as Daniel did the same and leaned back on the crate. He let out a breath and focused back on the sounds surrounding him. </p><p>
  <em>He could do this. </em>
</p><p>More bullets flew past them, getting closer and closer with each shot, and making the Detective’s surprise flinches worse every time. Out of the corner of his eye, Lucifer could see her frantically assessing their surroundings, looking for the way out that wasn’t there to be found. He wished he could be by her side, where he could feel her body solid against his, ease some of her worries and provide even the barest of supports, where she could ground him back to reality and bring him back to Lucifer once Samael finally took over... It would all be better and easier if the Douche wasn’t standing between them both oblivious to their struggles.</p><p>The only upside of all the bullets aimed at them flying around, and all the noises the minions were making – more than one minion for sure, <em>three</em> if his skills hadn’t failed him – was that Lucifer finally had a rough idea of where they were standing, if he could just get his hands to stop shaking so he could do something about it...</p><p>Lucifer closed his eyes and let out a long breath, allowing his mind to slip back to his old self, to when he did this for a living. When he opened them, the shaking was gone, and he could feel his dexterity at full capacity. He could do this, he repeated to himself.</p><p>
  <em>He could do this. </em>
</p><p>Determined, Sam reached to his side for Daniel’s firearm and took it out of his loose grip. In one swift motion, he half raised from behind the crate and three shots rang in the air, followed by the sound of three bodies dropping to the floor.</p><p>Both detectives were deadly silent for the longest seconds of his life. Lucifer turned around and fully leaned back on the metal crate, its cold a deep contrast to the fever taking over his body. This time, he couldn’t stop his hands from shaking around the weapon. “Clear.” His voice came out thick, and he let out another painful breath.</p><p>If those really were demons, he’d need all of the cockiness he could muster.</p><p>With a confidence he didn’t know where it was coming from, Lucifer placed Daniel’s weapon on the floor and swiftly stood up, marching around the crate to take a look at their trigger happy, murder friendly, demons.</p><p>Sure steps brought Samael to them, a sick grin stretching over his lips as he contemplated his artwork. It made him feel taller somehow. The sight of his enemies choking on their own blood at his feet while he rose above.</p><p>And as much as it loathed him to admit, he <em>enjoyed</em> it. The sight of deep, red blood, the way it made him feel, the adrenaline, the euphoria... He’d missed it.</p><p>“<em>You</em>…” One of the demons rasped out, coughing up blood when he forced himself to speak. “You were supposed to be dead.”</p><p>Samael crouched down by his side, a cold, calculated edge settling into his gaze as he tried to hide his obvious enjoyment. His disdain for the thing bleeding out on the floor was even more evident, bringing a sour taste to his lips. “You wish.” His lips pulled into a manic smirk, and it pleased him to see fear in the demon’s eyes. </p><p>Sam heard the detectives walk to the other two demons, not at all succeeding to keep their interests for his conversation hidden.</p><p>“You’ll be, when Command hears about this.” The demon tried to spit at him, but it only made the blood spread over its face. It was pathetic, really, and definitely beneath Sam. The demon coughed and pressed down on its bullet wound with a hiss, before it found the last of its strength to shout at Sam, words that were supposed to frighten him, but that didn’t mean anything at all anymore. “<em>He’ll hunt you down. Torture you until you beg for him to kill you</em>.”</p><p>“We’ll see about that.” </p><p>Sam got up as the detectives approached him, Daniel reaching to cuff the bleeding demon while she walked straight to him. The Detective placed a hand on his arm, her baby blue eyes wide with fear and confusion and just this side of hurt and panic. It shocked him out of the fog Sam had set around his mind, and Lucifer let her warmth wash away every last bit of what he used to be out of his conscious mind.</p><p>He was almost ready to talk to her when police sirens rang in the distance and he flinched away. Lucifer marched out of the warehouse, away from the painful reminder of his past, without looking back.</p>
<hr/><p>The cigarette stub he was putting out with the tip of his very expensive shoes was his third since he’d left the warehouse a few long minutes ago. Lucifer had watched the Detective pace around him like a caged animal, walking around, checking in with CSI, getting briefed by officers and setting a perimeter around the warehouse, all the while keeping him in her direct line of sight.</p><p>Lucifer wondered if she was keeping her eyes on him in reassurance that he was alright or to make sure he wouldn’t run away. He deeply rooted for the first, while consciously knowing it was probably the second.</p><p>From what little he’d heard, both the Detective and Daniel were being specifically vague about what had happened inside the warehouse, and Lucifer knew the demons wouldn’t say a word. His brothers would probably be by to take them away before the LAPD could even book them anyway. </p><p>In the end, it seemed his secret past would stay hidden from the police, at least for now.</p><p>Lucifer kicked the stub away when the detectives approached, putting an end to his quiet anxiousness.</p><p>“We need to talk.”</p>
<hr/><p>“You can’t be serious. <em>Spies?</em>” Daniel’s accusation rang around the much too quiet penthouse, his voice drilling into Lucifer’s brain, building into this headache growing behind his eyes that was just this side of blinding pain.</p><p>“Why don’t you start from the beginning?” The Doctor suggested, her eyes calm amidst the upcoming storm that had already reached him, filling his throat with water and slowly drowning him. </p><p>Lucifer hid a cough in a scuff, feeling smoke constricting his throat. His mind supplied the pictures of his childhood burning, and his eyes dropped to the floor immediately, burning in the foretelling of tears. </p><p>He’d left the crime scene with two highly perplexed detectives trailing after him, pressing for the conversation they needed and he dreaded. Lucifer had whisked Ms. Lopez as well and had called Doctor Linda to join them as well for some truth sharing.</p><p>They all deserved to know, even if that would put them in far more danger than he was comfortable with.</p><p>The Detective hadn’t said a word to him ever since he’d grabbed the Douche’s firearm to save their asses, and for some reason that was what was troubling him the most. Not Daniel’s incessant fits of interruptive-ness and his general disbelief, or Ms. Lopez’s ever-present cheerfulness, or even the Doctor’s cold, clinical eyes.</p><p>“The victim, our John Doe…” Lucifer began, but the words were stuck in his throat and he found himself unable to continue. He let out an annoyed breath and let his eyes drift around at his friends, sitting all over his living room. The Doctor had told him once that he should trust his friends more. Now seemed like the perfect moment to make good use of that advice, even if it dreaded him to the bottom of his soul. “Well, for starters, I know who killed him.” </p><p>“<em>What?</em>” They all exclaimed in unison, followed by long stretches of silence. </p><p>“Why didn’t you say so before?” The Detective broke the quietness, tentative eyes that barely concealed her hurt searching his as she shifted on her seat to rest her arms on her knees, much like Lucifer was in his armchair.</p><p>“I- I- I couldn’t… I-” He looked away, not bearing to see the disappointment in her. Even if he’d told them, they wouldn’t have believed him. They didn’t even believe in him right now. “The person that tortured our victim to death, he’s referred to as <em>Command</em>. He’s the head of a criminal organization called Underworld. The men at the warehouse today, they’re his minions. We call them Demons.”</p><p>Lucifer watched his friends’ faces as he shared what was to be confidential information. The varying degrees of belief he recognized in his audience had him turned into a pit of anxiousness. Doctor Linda had gone into therapist mode, Daniel seemed to think Lucifer was trying to trick him, and Ms. Lopez was maybe a tad too excited with the information. </p><p>But it was the pained acceptance in the Detective’s eyes that hurt him the most. Lucifer wished he could have told her sooner, wished she would’ve believed him, wished he wasn’t putting her in danger just by being near her, and he wished and wished and <em>wished</em>...</p><p>He wished so many things, but the Universe had never been kind to him.</p><p>“<em>We</em>? Who’s we?” The Detective asked, catching up to the little detail he’d slipped in his last sentence.</p><p>“The Family.” Lucifer shared, reluctant. Every bit of information, especially to detectives, especially to her, was a step closer to putting them in harm. More so if they decided to take the matters into their own hands and started investigating without knowing the full depth of that they were getting themselves into.  “My siblings and I, we were trained to be secret agents by Section 13, a division of Britain’s Military Intelligences.”</p><p>“So, you’re a secret spy? Is that what you’re saying?” Daniel scoffed at him, shifting back on his seat, crossing his arms to look more superior and invulnerable than he was. His doubt made Lucifer’s temper flare up, clouding what was already buried deep inside a fog.</p><p>“<em>Former</em> agent. <em>I got out</em>. I’m not active anymore.” Lucifer spat back, his anger slipping out of control for a second, a wildness returning to his eyes. He dropped them, letting out a calming breath as he forced himself to focus on his ring, spinning it around his finger to calm his mind.</p><p>It did little to help though, in the great scheme of things. Lucifer ran a hand through his messy hair and a shaky breath escaped his lips. It had been a bad idea, to tell them. It had been a <em>really bad</em> idea… His heartbeats started to increase slightly, the corners of his sight blacking out into nothingness and threatening to take his mind with them. </p><p>“<em>Okay</em>. Why do you think this Command guy is the one that killed our victim?” Ms. Lopez asked, pulling him out of the dark depths of his mind. Lucifer understood her attempts to stay with work related questions to keep them all focused on the bigger picture there. If only that would work...</p><p>“I’m sure you noticed the signs of torture. The lack of blood was also kind of hard to miss... but I was only sure because of the marks around the victim’s knees and elbows.” Lucifer numbered reluctantly, a hand reaching out to press at his own knee cap. “I have the same ones, and he put them there.” His voice was strangled, and he refused to look up.</p><p>The air in the room stilled in response to what he said, all eyes focusing on him. The pressure of their attention became too much. Lucifer could feel his anxieties setting in, flaring up, taking over, an unending fit of energy that got him on edge, that left him too wired to be still.</p><p>His fingers started drumming on his thigh without him meaning to, his eyes quietly sweeping the penthouse one more time. They lingered at his bar, at the quick forgetfulness he could get from the alcohol, but Lucifer forced himself to look away. It would be just his luck that his brothers would choose the time he was drunk to show up and kill him. But what a way to go...</p><p>“What are they from?” Ms. Lopez asked, breaking the newfound quietness and attracting Lucifer’s gaze in the same second. “I couldn’t determine…” She quieted down, having second thought her question. Her apologetic expression made him feel even worse.</p><p>“Burning metal rods. Can’t run if you can’t stand.” Lucifer choked out, feeling the air pressing down on him, his lungs ready to explode. His muscles were drawn taut, ready for action. His senses felt overloaded, his mind ticking, an infinite burst of energy taking over, and Lucifer just needed something to take the edge off, something to take his anger out on… some brothers to punch.</p><p>“I’m guessing those agents aren’t Interpol, then.” The Detective commented, breaking him out of his reverie, her voice strangely tight as well. </p><p>“They’re not. They’re my siblings, from MI13.” All eyes turned to him one more time, but Lucifer kept his solely focused on the Detective. He could feel his heart rate starting to slow down as he regarded her. If he could just keep focusing solely on her, it would almost seem like they were having a simple conversation, and he could pretend he didn’t have three more pairs of eyes on him, ready to judge his past.</p><p>She’d never done that, the Detective. She had always based her opinions of him on the person he was in the present, not who he had been, never looking at him through someone else’s eyes. It was maybe one of the main reasons that made him feel accepted and understood by her, even if she hadn’t known the complete story and therefore couldn’t know him whole.</p><p>She’d told him once that all that mattered to her was who he chose to be, and maybe that was why she could calm him down. He knew she wouldn’t judge him. And it began working, giving him enough clarity to think straight for once. </p><p>Enough clarity to think straight for days, since this dooming case had started.</p><p>Lucifer didn’t know why it happened, or how it happened, but it was working, and that was all that mattered at the moment. </p><p>“The blond one, it’s pretty obvious he’s your twin. What about the other one?” The Detective asked, and Lucifer found it easier to focus on her voice rather than on the subject, but life wasn’t that simple, it had never been, and he just couldn’t ignore the topic.</p><p>“Michael’s my twin, yes. Amenadiel…” He trailed off, trying to figure out a way to explain his messy relationship with those who once were the most important people in his life. “We might not be blood relatives, but we’re all siblings there.”</p><p>“What are they doing here? Are they after the same guy as we are?” Lucifer could see her turning into detective mode, <em>feel</em> it, like it was a physical thing, a wave that shifted the concern away from the forefront of her eyes. He always loved watching her excel at her job. Some days, he was just extra content to simply watch her work and ace it.</p><p>But the <em>topic</em> this time… The topic made his heart speed up out of control again. “They’re here to kill me.” Lucifer chocked out, feeling as if there wasn’t enough air for him to breathe. He could feel the heat on his skin, the fire melting his clothes and scarring his thigh, smoke so thick he could barely breathe or open his eyes.</p><p>Fire had ruined his life twice, burned his freedom to the ground.</p><p>“What? <em>Why</em>? Why would your <em>brothers</em> want to <em>kill</em> you?” The Detective asked, shifting to the edge of her seat, detective mode completely stripped out of her eyes in a second.</p><p>“They’ve tried before.” Lucifer leaned back on his armchair, bitterness coloring his tone, his eyes fixed on the floor. He could feel the pressure growing inside his head, and it was beginning to drive him insane. “I have a burn mark on my thigh from when they blew up my apartment back in London.”</p><p>Lucifer raised his hands to cover his face, pressing on his eyes and temples to just make the pain go away, fighting the urge to cover the scar marring his thigh. It had been years ago, and never before had it bothered him.</p><p>“Lucifer, why would they want to kill you?” The Doctor asked, her voice clinical, polished. Cold, even. It gave him a sense of normalcy, of structure, of order, and it deeply disturbed him at the same time. “Is it because you deserted? Because you wanted out?”</p><p>“I didn’t <em>desert</em>, Doctor. <em>They kicked me out!</em>” Lucifer exploded, the roar bursting out of him in rage. They’d <em>abandoned</em> him, left him <em>alone</em>, burned his <em>home</em> and his <em>future</em> and all he’d ever known... </p><p><em>Again</em>.</p><p>He was breathing down hard, his eyes wild, and when he managed to focus back and actually see his friends... they were all leaning back and away from him, a mix of surprise and fear in their eyes. The look the Detective sent him made his chest hurt, the void behind his breastbone growing into imaginable proportions.</p><p>Lucifer forced himself to calm down and look away. He’d never been good at it, controlling his anger. It always burst out of him on the worst of times. It had led him on more occasions than he’d like to admit. It had led him to do <em>unspeakable</em> things.</p><p>No more.</p><p>“I was captured in my last mission.” Lucifer spoke out of the blue, dropping his head in his hands, leaning his elbows on his knees. It was easier to do this, to tell them how screwed up he’d gotten, what had turned him into the mess he was now, if he didn’t have to look into their eyes. “I don’t bloody know if someone screwed up or if I was sold, but they knew I was there.”</p><p>Silence stretched on for a second, his friends slowly shifting closer to him again, seeing his outburst had passed.</p><p>“The Family rescued me ten weeks too late. By then, I wasn’t fit to be an agent anymore.” His hands shook from the memories, from the cold of the hole he’d been thrown into that was creeping back up his bones. When he tried to speak next, his voice faltered, stuck inside him. “I’m <em>broken</em>. I’m a liability to them.”</p><p>When Lucifer finally managed to look up, the pity and the fear and the tension coming from the four pairs of eyes staring down his soul was enough to make him avert his gaze again.</p><p>“Your back…” The Detective said slowly, testing the waters for his reaction. All Lucifer managed to do was briefly meet her eyes, before it was all too much. “<em>Command</em> did that to you?” </p><p>Lucifer could see the Detective’s mouth working, her eyes fixed on him, he could hear her, her voice drifting through the air like silk. He knew she was speaking, he just couldn’t understand her. He couldn’t process words into a comprehensive sentence, couldn’t get his mind to function again.</p><p>His entire body was freezing, a cold he’d never felt before. It went as deep as his bones, making his heart hurt from beating inside him in such a cold temperature. The trembling in his hands got so out of control he buried them on his hair, letting his head drop down, his fingers intertwining through his hair at the back of his head.</p><p>In retrospect, it hadn’t been his wisest decision. Leaning down made the nausea grow worse, bile rising up his throat and making his mouth taste bitter. Lucifer pulled on his hair, to feel something other than the numbness that was trying to eat him alive, but the pain was too little compared to everything else.</p><p>That only made him think about worse pains, and that had his mind spiraling down the rabbit hole. Only this time, that hole was real, and it had been a cell engulfed with the dark, too small for him to move, too tiny for him to stand, only working to get him mad.</p><p>His own screams rang in his ears and Lucifer pressed the hills of his palms to them, but that only made the sound reverberate louder inside his skull. Unseeing, dead, cold eyes stared at him through his mind’s eye, a future that was to be his own, one that he’d been destined to ever since getting captured the last time.</p><p>Lucifer thought he’d throw up. The urge hit him all at once, memories of his unimaginable pain, of the dead spy, and the torture, and the wounds... <em>and that could’ve been him</em>... And he tried to think of the waves, he <em>really</em> did, but they turned into a tsunami, only building into the perfect storm of his madness. </p><p>“Lucifer?” He heard her voice despite the water consuming him, drowning him in the dark, and when he looked up, there she was. Crouched in front of him with a look of infinite gentleness, far more than he ever deserved. Perfect, pure, good. Untouched by the world, unscathed by the monstrosities of his past. “Hey…” The Detective reached out, her hands covering his. She wrapped her fingers around his and slowly encouraged him to let go of his hair.</p><p>When she’d pulled his hands away, she caught them between her own and held tight. He felt her warmth, and for a second, he could breathe again.</p><p>“I- I- I have to go… I have to- I need to <em>run</em>.” Lucifer pulled his hands from hers, paranoia taking back control. His eyes grew wide again and he grew restless, all the calmness she’d brought him gone in a second. Lucifer tried to get up, but the Detective gently pushed him back to his seat, taking hold of his upper arms and crouching back down in front of him.</p><p>“Lucifer, hey... Why do you think you need to run?” She asked, her voice gentle and her eyes insistent on his as she tried to get him to focus, but he worked out of his way to avoid her. If he saw... care... or- or <em>worry</em> in them, he’d break, and Lucifer wasn’t sure he would be able to pull himself together after that.</p><p>“He can’t- I can’t-” Lucifer pushed her hands away, feeling trapped in his own skin. His eyes frantically searched the place for an escape route. He <em>had</em> to get out of there. He needed an out and he needed it <em>now</em>. “You don’t understand, I <em>can’t</em> go through that again. I can’t let him take me, no. I have to go... I have to <em>run</em>-”</p><p>Lucifer knew he sounded insane – hell, he felt insane – and his friends probably thought he’d lost it as well – but he couldn’t bring himself to care. His mind was focused on only one thing and it was that <em>he needed to leave</em>.</p><p>And he couldn’t breathe.</p><p>Lucifer was panicking. He felt as if the world didn’t have enough air for him to breathe, he couldn’t gulp it down to ease the burning in his lungs, but at the same time it felt as if he was breathing too much. Like the air was coming in and out in heavy pants, and he just couldn’t hold it.</p><p>His chest felt as if it was going to explode, the pounding in his heart so loud he could barely hear anything else. Lucifer pressed a hand to his chest, his fingers gripping his shirt as he pushed down, forcefully trying to stop his chest from hurting, to stop it from breathing wrong, to stop breathing altogether, just stop.</p><p>
  <em>It was just too much. </em>
</p><p>“Lucifer, I need you to breathe, okay?” The Detective’s voice was sweet and calm and firm, rising above the panic that was swallowing him whole. But she needed him to breathe? Wasn’t he doing that already?</p><p>She reached out a hand to cup his cheek, the roughness of his stubble scraping against her thumb as it caressed his jaw. It was such a strange thing, amidst all this confusion, all the uncertainty, all the madness, all the panic... there she was, always guiding him back to her.</p><p>Lucifer had been so focused on her touch, that it gradually began to feel easier to draw a breath, and he barely noticed when the Detective had reached out to cover the hand pressing at his chest to keep him from hurting himself.</p><p>He was still a bit dazed, still a bit dizzy, and his lungs still burned from the lack of air, but he could feel himself start to regain this battle against his mind that had turned his body into a battlefield.</p><p>“What-” Lucifer tried to ask but his voice failed, his throat rasping at how dry it was.</p><p>“You’re having a panic attack, but we got it.” Her voice was quiet, calm, and the exact opposite of what he felt.</p><p>Panic washed down on him not a second later, filling up his throat until it became impossible to draw breath. Wide, wild eyes frantically searched the Doctor’s, and the look he found in her, the silent acceptance, was confirmation enough.</p><p>Somehow realizing what was happening to him only made it worse.</p><p>Lucifer tried to stop himself from panicking, to control his breathing, will his heart to stop beating so fast, keep the bile and the nausea away from him, close his eyes to stop being so dizzy... but it was futile. The more he tried, the more it seemed his body refused to listen to him, and the more it seemed like he wasn’t in control of himself.</p><p>And that was what he hated the most in life. His greatest fear.</p><p>“Lucifer, look at me. It’s okay.” The Detective said, breaking through to him, but it wasn’t enough. She reached out and cupped his cheeks, forcing his eyes to meet hers. Her touch kept his mind from flying away, but he still felt a stranger in his body. “We’ve got this, okay? Come on, just breathe with me. That’s it, in and out. You’re okay, and you’re safe. I’m here for you.” She kept chanting like a mantra, over and over again, until it was seared into his brain. “Everything’s going to be okay.”</p><p>It took a while, but eventually his breathing started slowing down. Oxygen began filling his brain again, and his vision returned to focus, but there was still some underlying fear in him, something fragile that could send his mind spiraling out of his control again.</p><p>“You’re okay.”</p><p>This time, Lucifer managed to give her a messy nod, gathering whatever scrape of trust he still held within himself and offering it all to her, <em>needing</em> her to be right. One of her hands sneaked out to play with the stranded curls on his nape, and Lucifer closed his eyes and let out a shuddering breath.</p><p>He could feel the balance begin to settle in, even though his lungs still burned from the lack of air.</p><p>“Lucifer... You’re not leaving, okay?” The Detective’s words were soft enough that it took him a second to grasp the depth of what she’d said. Lucifer’s eyes snapped open in a split second, all the progress he’d made being washed away. “I’m not letting you out of my sight. There’s no chance I’m just going to step aside and watch you run away. Running never works, never fixes anything. It just makes you keep running away until you can’t move anymore.”</p><p>His heart was spinning out of control again, hammering against his ribs to the point Lucifer thought it was going to burst out of him. If he’d felt wired before... it was nothing compared to now.</p><p>Now he felt trapped. And not by his own skin. He felt trapped by his brothers, by Command, by his life, his past...</p><p>And it was physically impossible for Lucifer to stay still, seated there, trapped by her presence, solid in front of him, but she had him.</p><p>“You don’t understand, I <em>have</em> to- I...” He tried to make her understand, to reason, to escape, to <em>survive</em>... but Lucifer didn’t have control of himself anymore.</p><p>“Hey, they can’t hurt you, anymore. They <em>won’t</em> get you. You’re safe here.” The Detective stressed every word, her eyes bored deeply on his, her fingers never ceasing their tangling in his wayward nape curls... and Lucifer wished he could believe her, he <em>really</em> did. He’d felt drawn to her like he’d never felt before. She’d made him feel so much. <em>Too much</em>, even. </p><p>She’d made him feel safe, and cared, and <em>loved</em>, for the first time in his life.</p><p>But he’d trusted people before and being abandoned by her would hurt more than he could take.</p><p>“You don’t know that.” Lucifer choked out the words, his head sloppily shaking from side to side as he tried to push her away – be it from him, from danger, from his past... he didn’t even know anymore – but she was too strong.</p><p>The hand that was cupping his cheek slowly made its way down to his chest. The Detective lightly brushed her knuckles over his breastbone at first, but the tentative touch slowly gained pressure. </p><p>It was calming and comforting, and something else for him to focus other than the panic and the constant threat to his life hanging over his head.</p><p>“<em>I won’t let them</em>.” The Detective promised, her eyes so blue in the low amber lights of the penthouse, so soft and caring, so trustworthy, so sure... Lucifer couldn’t resist her. And he didn’t know if he ever wanted to.</p><p>He didn’t protest when her hands tugged him closer to her, her arms tentatively circling his waist, her touch lighter than feathers. His own arms stayed limp at his side, hanging loosely and uselessly. Lucifer allowed his head to rest on the offered shoulder and buried his face on her neck, breathing in the floral scent of her hair. It was calming, the calmest he’d been in days, and he just allowed himself to be... until he could finally feel the sun warming his skin, taste the salt in the air... and hear the waves inside his mind.</p>
<hr/><p>Lucifer didn’t know how long he’d stayed that way, letting the Detective calm him down, trying to glue himself together after breaking down in front of all his friends. And he didn’t know how, if it had been a conscious decision or just instinct – personally, he liked to think it was an unconscious want – but his hands had come to rest on her waist, softly holding her there next to him.</p><p>But the one thing he knew with certainty was that the elevator had chimed, and its doors were sliding open.</p><p>Lucifer hadn’t realized he’d gotten up at first, or that he’d reached for the Detective’s holstered weapon as he did so, but his aim was sure on the elevator when it fully opened, all his muscles drawn taut with tension. All the calming relief the Detective had stirred on him now truly gone.</p><p>She was pushed back in surprise, wavering on her crouch as she tried to keep some semblance to balance, and all his friends flinched away from him a second time that night. Doctor Linda rose her hands in a surrendering gesture while Daniel drew his own weapon and Ms. Lopez just gaped at him.</p><p>Lucifer knew they hadn’t heard the elevator, but it didn’t stop their reactions from hurting.</p><p>When Michael and Amenadiel walked out of the metal box and into the marble floors, their steps echoed all the way to the inside of Lucifer’s skull, reverberating so, so loudly that he could barely hear his own thoughts. His siblings raised their hands once they found themselves at gunpoint, and the weight on the atmosphere grew, the painful reality of Lucifer’s story impossibly evident for all his friends to see.</p><p>“Put down your weapon, Samael. We mean you no harm.” Amenadiel hid his command in a placating tone, but it didn’t stop the low timbre of his voice from resonating through the still ambient.</p><p>Lucifer stared at his brothers, faces he hadn’t seen in years, voices he hadn’t heard in ages... and a smile began tugging on the corner of his lips. But not the nice kind.</p><p>The laugh that escaped his lips bordered on insanity, echoing through the still ambient of the penthouse. He could feel the shrill of his voice creeping up the edges of his consciousness, letting way for his irrational fears to flood back into his mind and take control of him.</p><p>“I’m having a hard time believing that.” Lucifer replied, his voice deadly serious, his features sobering up in a split second. His brothers reacted to his change as well, their stance visibly tightening to a half fighting position.</p><p>The Detective got up from her crouch, coming to stand by his side in a silent show of support. Just that made him breathe a little easier, his mind just a bit more comfortable with this impossible situation. Knowing she was by his side no matter what made Lucifer feel invincible, despite the situation having been designed to make him feel powerless.</p><p>Daniel stood up as well, his hand going to hover above his now holstered weapon. The Doctor and Ms. Lopez also shifted on the couch, turning to assess his brothers while trying to make themselves as small as possible.</p><p>“How did you get in?” Lucifer asked, shifting the subject from his brothers’ mission for as long as he could. He wasn’t keen on losing his life that night.</p><p>“Your security system isn’t exactly great, brother.” Michael scoffed as he took a slow step forward, placing himself directly in the center of Lucifer’s aim. He unconsciously tightened his grip on the firearm, the bloody thing feeling as if it weighted several tons more than it did. “Put your gun down, Sammy. You look pathetic holding it up.”</p><p>The smirk Michael directed his way made him freeze despite himself. The cold, clinical detachment in Michael’s blue eyes sent a chill running down his spine, his shiver visible enough that it made Michael grin, the gun too heavy in his hands.</p><p>“Relax, little bro, we’re only here to talk.” </p><p>“Right. Because that’s always gone smoothly.” Lucifer tried to scoff, but the tightness in his voice was just too great to hide it. The Detective shifted closer to his side, coming to stand just that much closer to him. Her hand briefly brushed his lower back, and it made him confident in himself, but that also made his anxiety grow tenfold.</p><p>She would definitely be safer away from him.</p><p>Michael’s gaze fixed on the Detective, and it made his blood run colder than ice inside his veins. That easygoing attitude his brother was going for didn’t cut it for him. It had always suited Lucifer better.</p><p>Michael’s eyes just never ever seemed to lose that artic coldness, the unfreezing ice, the sharpness of his personality. He tried too much to seem relaxed, and it only made it worse for Lucifer.</p><p>He knew just what lingered beneath the visage of Michael. The mask, the charade that was his brother.</p><p>“We’re not here to fight, Sam.” Amenadiel stepped into their silent staring match, that soft tone that had tricked him so many times before in full use now. “We’re here because we need your help.”</p><p>His heart skipped a beat, his gaze shifting from brother to brother, from blue eyes to brown ones, from blonde hair to a bald head, from quiet anxiousness to fake comfort. Lucifer felt the Detective growing stiff by his side as well, the tension of the situation too much for any of them to bear on their own.</p><p>Without him meaning to, that same manic laughter from before rose up his throat and spilled out of his lips, shocking his brothers and his partner, and quite frankly, himself. His limited control over his emotions thinned as the minutes ticked by. “I’m sorry. Am I supposed to believe that?” He asked, a hint of mockery and laughter coloring his voice.</p><p>“You’ve figured out who the killer is by now, haven’t you?” Amenadiel asked, his tone leveled as he stepped forward. That same tone that had gotten through to him in countless occasions in the past, the tone that was meant to calm him down when Father yelled at him or beat him, or when he was at odds with one of their siblings. That tone was messing with him now, making his grip on the gun falter as his heart beat out of control. “We’re here for him, but we need your help. You know more about him than any one of us.”</p><p>Amenadiel’s words stole the breath out of his lungs. The confirmation that this wasn’t just some misunderstanding from the Family, that this wasn’t some hallucination Lucifer was too deep in to notice... it made blood rush in his veins with his quickening heartbeats, pounding too loudly in his ears. For a second, it seemed the Earth had started spinning the other way around, the corners of his vison blurring, and the gun felt too heavy in his grip. He couldn’t keep holding it up.</p><p>“No.” Lucifer’s response was barely above a whisper, the roughness of his voice pulling at his throat. That imperceptible shake was back to his hands, the one that stole all his strength away. He slowly lowered the gun, afraid he’d do more harm than not holding it up.</p><p>Unfortunately, it didn’t mean his mind had gotten numb as well. It was still on high alert, too aware of everything to allow him room to breathe, and it was slowly bringing Lucifer to the edge of sanity.</p><p>“<em>No? </em>” Michael asked back, incredulous, closing his eyes for a second as he tried to keep his temper in check. “Wrong answer.” His words were rock solid, with a deep fury glistening in his eyes as he stepped forward, crowding into Lucifer’s safe space. Even with the ominous pressure of Michael’s threat hanging over him, Lucifer couldn’t raise the gun to protect himself. “He tortured you for <em>months</em>, Samael! How can <em>you</em> not want revenge? How can you allow him to be free and continue to do that to our siblings? He already killed one, Johaniel, right here in this city.”</p><p>Each step forward Michael took made Lucifer flinch. It was bordering on pathetic, how the mere presence of his twin could create a vortex of panic inside his mind and trap him in an endless nightmare.</p><p>Being bluntly faced with... the <em>torture</em> he’d gone through, and somehow making it his fault that his capturer was still alive and about...</p><p>The pain around his kneecaps was so great that Lucifer almost fell to the ground, unable to keep standing. He needed Michael to stop talking, to stop being near him, to stop provoking him... just <em>stop</em>. </p><p>“You <em>betrayed</em> me! You <em>abandoned</em> me!” Lucifer shouted, losing control of his temper for a second, his words thundering in the still air. “You all should have stopped him from taking me! Father should’ve known better!” Once the words were out, it was hard to calm down. All the years he’d suffered from it, because of it. All the pain, all the misery, all the nightmares and traumas...</p><p>The Detective reached out for him, her hand resting above his on the gun, her thumb sneaking around to caress the inside of his wrist. It grounded Lucifer back to the world, out of his mind, of his suffering, of his pain. The gun slipped from his grip, falling to the floor with a clang of metal, somewhat final and freeing for him at the same time.</p><p>“I trusted you to have my back. You should have known better...” Lucifer whispered, his heavy tone breaking in the end as tears prickled his eyes. “I won’t do your dirty work anymore.”</p><p>Rage coiled deep within Michael, blazing out of his crisp blue eyes, but Lucifer was too numb, too out of himself to be afraid. “You’re going to do your <em>job</em> and-”</p><p>“He said <em>no</em>.” The Detective interfered, her tone imposing and sure, her steps bringing her to stand in front of him. All eyes stared at her in return, shocked and hateful and fearful gazes... but in Lucifer’s there was only wonder. “So why don’t you do <em>your</em> job and take care of your own shit?”</p><p>Once again trapped between two words, between his past and his future, between keeping her safe from his world and letting her protect him.</p><p>Lucifer needed a break. He needed a moment of silence, where he didn’t have to always worry about his life, about keeping everyone safe from the world, where he wouldn’t have to think or to fight or to lose, where there was no pain and he could simply be. With her.</p><p>It had been so long since he’d had it, a quiet moment, someone to take care of him, where all he had to worry about was resting and being happy.</p><p>How he needed it... but the world had never been gentle to him.</p><p>No, instead, the air around him was drenched with tension, all eyes shifting between the brothers and his brave Detective. Lucifer wanted to step in front of her, make himself the target, keep her safe from every bad thing in his past... but he felt much too powerless to even blink.</p><p>He was exhausted to the deep of his bones. Several nights without sleep, a pile of tension filled situations, fears and regrets and so many possibilities... He was just so <em>tired</em>.</p><p>Not that anyone seemed to care. They were always wanting him to do this or get that or make this possible... But not her. She cared, always had. The Detective was protecting him, even now, even after knowing about his past. There was so much more he had to tell her... but he knew she would be there for him.</p><p>That thought was strangely comforting, all things considered.</p><p>“I do hope you reconsider our offer, Samael. You know how to reach us when you do.” Amenadiel spoke up again, his voice that same calming, authoritative tone he used to use on Lucifer.</p><p>His brother’s eyes remained on him for long seconds, until he turned around and walked to the elevator.</p><p>“The name’s Lucifer.” He added as a second thought, an important piece of information he wished his brothers acknowledged. The rift he’d imposed between his present and his past.</p><p>Amenadiel haltered on his steps while Michael simply scoffed and kept walking, until even Amenadiel shook his head, breaking out of his stupor to disappear inside the elevator.</p><p>Even after hearing the dingle of the elevator closing its doors and beginning its descent, there was still something about it that had Lucifer’s gaze trapped. It put him under a trance, made him freeze in place as if he was stuck in the moment, his mind trapped in an endless loop of all the worst things that had ever happened to him.</p><p>“Hey...” It was a faint noise at first, sounding just beside him, then it was a touch on his arm, soft and warm. But it hadn’t felt like it at first, and, on instinct, Lucifer had flinched away, gripping said hand in a firm grip.</p><p>Her pained hiss cut right through his haze, drilling inside his mind and forcefully pulling him back to reality. Lucifer’s eyes widened as he let go of her in horror and staggered back, away from her. He hadn’t... not her... <em>never her</em>.</p><p>“<em>I’m sorry</em>, I’m sor-” His voice failed as he tried to apologize for hurting the one person he had never meant to hurt in his life. Shame was threatening to rip him in half, and he felt trapped in his own skin, his eyes fixed on the floor.</p><p>“It’s okay, Lucifer. I’m fine.” The Detective threatened to take a step closer, her hand raised and meaning to touch his arm, but the red mark his grip had left on her wrist was impossible to hide. Lucifer rose his own hands up to keep her away, taking a hasty step backwards. “Hey, it was instinct, I get it. It’s okay, I’m okay.”</p><p>“No, no it- it’s not, I- I didn’t mean to- I’m- I’m sorry...” He tried to apologize, his slurring speech stumbling on the words. There was a weight to his chest, physically pulling him down, too heavy and exhausting and it made his control over his own mind falter.</p><p>His hands rose to tangle through his hair, pulling at the hair gel to let it curl into a mess. Lucifer felt like he was about to lose it, his sanity or his grasp in reality, or maybe he’d already lost it. He didn’t know anymore.</p><p>The world was just so confusing.</p><p>Or maybe it was his sight that was blurring, making him feel like the world was spinning around him too quickly for him to follow. Even his instincts were off, making him hurt the Detective like he had mere moments ago.</p><p>Lucifer dug his fingernails into his scalp and pulled at his hair strands, hard. The waves in his mind that were supposed to calm him were building up a storm, agony coming with the flood.</p><p>“You did the right thing, Lucifer.” Doctor Linda’s voice broke through the myriad that was his mind, shocking him down to his core. His eyes snapped to hers, his focus solely on her. It was the very single thing he’d wanted to hear all his life... “What you went through... It’s not your fault. It’s not your responsibility to get this man. It would be <em>traumatic</em> for you, possibly more so than what’s in your past now. It’s more than okay to think of yourself and your wellbeing first. No one can blame you for that.”</p><p>Lucifer understood her words, her line of thought, the very same thing that he had pursued his entire life, but he couldn’t stop feeling like there was something wrong. Deep down, he knew refusing his brother’s plan had been the right move, but the guilt was still there, in the backseat of his consciousness. It was this nagging feeling at the back of his throat that many spies had been tortured and would still be tortured all because he hadn’t been strong enough to stop the man that had ruined him. That somehow it was all his fault.</p><p>And it was exhausting, thinking like this. Especially when all he wanted and needed was sleep.</p><p>The next time the Detective reached out to him, Lucifer let her. It was a hand at his wrist at first, a soft smile, gentle eyes. Then she carefully pulled his hands out of his hair and stroked her thumbs to his palms. She began pulling him back to his armchair, the comfort she provided vital for him to keep standing.</p><p>Lucifer let her lead him, blindly, without questions, without making it harder, without doubts.</p><p>He was pushed to seat back on the armchair, try to relax, let go of all the tension pulling at his muscles, let go of his fighting stance. The Detective stayed by his side, one of his hands tightly grasping hers as Lucifer tried to gain reign over his mind again.</p><p>It was easy enough in the silence, with the Detective’s presence near him, in the familiar feel of his penthouse. It would’ve worked, hadn’t Daniel’s impatience gotten in the way of things.</p><p>“So, now what?” He asked, his tone dangerously close to bordering on bored. “What?” He threw back, somewhat undignified, when all eyes turned accusatorily towards him.</p><p>Lucifer cleaned his throat, trying to get rid of the lump growing there. Sometimes it just felt like he’d never, ever be able to get another restful moment in his life. “There’s a house. Off the grid. It’ll do until I can find something better for us.”</p><p>“<em>Us</em>? Excuse me?” The Detective interrupted his mental planning of their escape, catching onto one of the details he’d rather not fight them about at the moment.</p><p>“Michael and Amenadiel... they won’t stop until they have me on their side, whether I want to be there or not. They <em>will</em> try to threaten one of you to force my hand. It’s not beneath them.” Lucifer emphasized, locking his eyes with the Detective’s, needing whatever shred of force she could spur in him. “And I can’t-” His voice got stuck on the ball constricting his throat, panic rising on him at just the mere action of putting his fears into words. Quickly enough, he looked away from her eyes, not bearing to witness all the emotions harbored there. “I can’t let them hurt you.”</p><p>“We can’t just run away.” Daniel interrupted, completely oblivious that his heartfelt expression of feelings and fear was mostly directed at his Detective. Lucifer had never thought of himself as someone so transparent with his feelings – not that he understood them most of the time – but these situations of stress certainly had a way of stripping him bare.</p><p>Pointing out that his brothers were real danger, as was Command, were any of them to find his friends, got him nowhere. Daniel was too headstrong in not running away, and it quickly spread to the others as well. It’d briefly made Lucifer panic when everyone was against him, but deep down he knew running wouldn’t be the right way to go.</p><p>Running was hard, and infinite, but at least it was doing something instead of just standing still and waiting to be targeted.</p><p>At least Daniel and the Detective had agreed to send the child to stay with Daniel’s parents for a few days.</p><p>Lucifer had been so spent after their last discussion that even Ms. Lopez refrained from asking him too many questions about his past.</p><p>But, eventually, they had had to leave.</p><p>Lucifer thought his heart was going to burst out of his chest as he watched the elevator close and start its descent. The Detective had held his hand to keep him calm, saying they were perfectly capable of taking care of themselves, over and over again, until he started to believe her.</p><p>Unfortunately, it had done little to stop the mad pounding of his heart against his ribcage. Lucifer wasn’t used to feeling this worry, this intense concern. Before, it had only happened when the Detective was concerned, which had sent his mind down another spiral that he was in no way able to handle at that particular moment in time.</p><p>“Hey, how are you feeling?” The Detective’s soft tone drifted around him and Lucifer forced his lids to open, any chance to get a rest completely out of his plans. She moved to sit by his hip on the couch he was sprawled over, thoroughly exhausted form the day, but still unable to rest. “You think you can manage to get some sleep tonight?” </p><p>He gave her a tired smile in response, not even trying to fool any of them that he might actually sleep while his brothers were still out there to trouble his mind.</p><p>“I can stay, if you want me to.” She offered in a small voice, unsure eyes drifting to the purple bags under his. The hand in her lap shifted, as if she wanted to reach out to him but didn’t know if it would be welcome.</p><p>It would. But he couldn’t let her. As much as he wanted her to, Lucifer couldn’t let her.</p><p>“Why would you? I- I hurt you... I don’t understand.” Lucifer asked back, his confusion clear on his tone and on the frown taking over his features. She was a mystery, his Detective, especially when she gave him small smiles, like the ones she always had on when he failed to understand the simple things, even when he’d been a monster and hurt her.</p><p>“You did.” She confessed, plunging a knife through his heart and twisting it inside. She slowly brought her fingers to touch the wrist he’d grabbed, that was fortunately unbruised. Lucifer leaned back on the couch, tense, hurt, trying to give her space, trying to be far away from her, where he wouldn’t hurt her anymore. “You hurt me, but I know you didn’t mean to.”</p><p>Her eyes softened with her words, wrinkling at the corners, brightening up with her smile. Lucifer wanted to raise his hand and touch it, feel the softness of her skin on his fingertips, feel the intensity of her love, the joy of her happiness. He wanted to keep her close at all times, make sure she was safe from his old life, from the world, and keep this peace she spurred on him forever present.</p><p>So, he nodded, shy, and she stayed.</p>
<hr/><p>
  <em> “Mr. Morningstar? This is Officer Reyes. I’m calling to inform you of an accident.” </em>
</p><p>His heart stopped beating inside his chest. The world was out of focus with only the rhythmic pounding of blood too loud in his ears. Lucifer felt lightheaded, like he was floating away, but at the same time freefalling into a bottomless abyss ready to swallow him in the dark.</p><p>There was a clatter, but he wasn’t sure if it was the sound of this phone slipping from his grasp and falling to the floor, or just the sound of his soul shattering.</p><p>Lucifer had gone into autopilot after that. He had no memories of ever leaving his balcony, or getting into the elevator, or driving to the damned street where the Detective’s car had crashed.</p><p>Lucifer was vaguely aware of the place, having driven by this street and some others nearby on his way to her house.</p><p>His hands were shaking when he turned the keys off to kill the engine, and it was particularly harder to take them off the ignition then it ought to be. Lucifer got out of his car in shaky legs, not used to being on this side of the yellow tape.</p><p>Usually when he got to a crime scene, the Detective was by his side, trying to control his bursts of excitement. Each scene was a thrill, a new puzzle, some more challenging than others. He had always been on the investigative side, even during Delilah’s case.</p><p>This time, the police lights he’d gotten so accustomed to, the officers walking around, the flashing CSI cameras... this time it was making him sick. He wasn’t used to this.</p><p>To all this agony that came from watching the Detective’s car in the middle of that mess of police officers, with her nowhere in sight.</p><p>Two pairs of skid marks led from the middle of the street to the point where the Detective had crashed into a nearby tree, broken glass spread around what was left of the vehicle. Its painting was chipped out on the side, as if the owner of the second set of tire marks on the asphalt had tried to drive her off the street.</p><p>The pounding of his heart grew worse as the seconds went by and he was forced to stare at what, in his educated opinion, was anything but an accident.</p><p>Several officers walked past him where he was frozen beside the corvette. All with sympathy looks, some with pitying gazes, but all of them leading to... an ambulance.</p><p>There, at the other side of the scene, with the lights off and no medics around. Just his Detective, <em>alive</em>, and Daniel and Ms. Lopez.</p><p>Long strides took Lucifer to her side in a flash. Up close, he could see the bruise threatening to form on the side of her face, the cut on her left brow that wasn’t bleeding anymore, the purple bags beneath her eyes, the sling holding her arm hostage, and the orange shock blanket wrapped around her shoulders.</p><p>She was alright. She was okay and she was <em>alive</em>. She was... she would be fine. Just a couple bruises, just an accident, just a scare. She was alright.</p><p>For the first time since he’d answered the phone, Lucifer felt all that desperation threatening to consume him finally start to settle down, letting his muscles go from the taut grip. </p><p>Lucifer heard them call his name, all three of them with their eyes locked at him, but he didn’t say a word. He stood to the side, his gaze fixed on his Detective as he tried to keep his hands from shaking and his mind from breaking down.</p><p>The paramedics’ return put a stop to his friends’ attempt to make him talk, which Lucifer was grateful for. The medics also made sure to assure him the Detective was fine, much to Lucifer’s relief, and that she wouldn’t need to go to the hospital, much to Lucifer’s dismay.</p><p>His panic screamed at him that she should go to the hospital, just to be sure. She would also be safer there. With countless doctors and nurses and security. Where it wouldn’t be strange if he were to stay by her side all the time.</p><p>Unfortunately, the words only sounded in his mind, and the paramedics left before he could protest.</p><p>Lucifer remained perfectly silent, keeping up with a seemingly calm exterior while his mind was racing all over the place. He couldn’t stop constantly checking their surroundings, looking for any signs of his brothers or the demons, any officer that shouldn’t be there. He felt the paranoia creeping back up the corners of his consciousness, the anxiety rushing back in, taking control of his tense muscles, getting him ready for an imminent fight. </p><p>“It was just a freak accident, Lucifer. I’m okay.” The Detective’s voice pierced through his panicking mind, her hand touching his arm flinching him back to the now.</p><p>His eyes snapped back to hers in a split second, taking in the soft tone in her features. She was trying to comfort him, that much was clear, but shouldn’t that be the other way around? Wasn’t that his job?</p><p>Lucifer was convinced it was, but the words that left his mouth were strikingly different. “Twice in less than six months?” He’d tried not to voice his fears, but it was stronger than him. He felt the impact of his observation on all of them almost instantly and resumed his task of watching the perimeter.</p><p>“You think your brothers could have done this?” Ms. Lopez asked, shifting to start looking around as well.</p><p>“I know they could, especially if they brought Uriel along. He’s an expert on making things seem like accidents.”</p><p>Lucifer’s new shred of information got Daniel in on his paranoia, a third set of eyes to scan their surroundings. Out of the corner of his eye, he watched the Detective roll her eyes at them.</p><p>She suddenly got up, ditched the shock blanket and started going around to thank the officers who were still working the scene. Lucifer rushed to her side, resuming his regular place by her shoulder as she walked around.</p><p>After that particular task was done, all four of them agreed to drive to the Detective’s place. Ms. Lopez and Daniel also seemed reluctant to leave her, and somehow it felt to him like maybe accompanying the Detective was mostly for their own sake than for hers.</p><p>In the end, she decided to ride with him. He knew it was mostly for him, to calm his nerves down, but he couldn’t help the anxiety hitting top levels inside him. Not when his old life had hurt her.</p><p>“You really think your family would arrange an accident just to force you to help them?” The Detective asked, trying to look unaffected by the whole thing, but Lucifer could see the hesitancy in her, hear the tiny, almost imperceptible flutter in her tone.</p><p>He didn’t answer her, but his look was enough. His grip tightened on the wheel, his knuckles turning white, and she reached out to him, her hand resting on his knee.</p><p>The ride was silent after that.</p>
<hr/><p>Lucifer urged her to the couch the moment they stepped inside her apartment, but it was impossible to sit down by her side. </p><p>Ms. Lopez and Daniel were spread around the couches, leaving a free spot for him next to the Detective, but he was too busy pacing around and checking outside through the living room window.</p><p>“Lucifer...” He heard the Detective calling him, her voice low, and his eyes immediately fell on hers. Lucifer considered sitting down by her side to keep them both calm – between two cops and a former agent they were as secure as they could ever be – but the door springing open decided against it for him.</p><p>He was making his way to the door, his long strides quickly taking him there, but he haltered when he saw who it was.</p><p>“Hey. What’s with the murderous look?” Maze asked as she got inside, sidestepping him to drop her duffle bag on the kitchen counter and busying herself with checking the fridge.</p><p>“Where have you been, Maze?” Lucifer asked, his voice seemingly stuck inside his throat. He walked back to stand behind the Detective on the couch, placing his hands on the backrest to try to calm himself down.</p><p>“I was bounty hunting. I thought I told you about it.” She turned around with a disinterested look that quickly slipped away once she noticed the general concern going around on the couch. “What’s going on here?” She asked in a tone that almost seemed concerned.</p><p>“Chloe was in an accident and Lucifer thinks his brothers caused it.” Daniel answered before Lucifer could, and the flashing panic that took over Maze’s features didn’t go unnoticed by him.</p><p>“<em>Your brothers</em>? Since when are they here?” Maze asked, stepping closer to him, her fleeting fear turning into some sort of anger. “And since when do they know about your family?” She gestured to their friends this time, almost accusatorily so.</p><p>As if Lucifer wanted to ever tell them about the failures of his past.</p><p>“Well, you missed quite a lot, Maze.” He spat at her, turning around, not bothering to hide his annoyance. “You went off bounty hunting and <em>Command</em> showed up the next day.” Lucifer gritted out, his words laced with anger at her absence. It was her flinch that made his words click inside his mind, his fear rising up with them. “Maze, who was your oh, so timely, bounty?”</p><p>“Lucifer…” Maze said slowly, carefully, as she took a step towards him, out of the kitchen and into the living room.</p><p>“Who was it, Maze?” He insisted, pressing on his words, and he could see her falter on her steps.</p><p>“You know who.” She said, her voice somber. The confirmation to his fear... it stole the air from his lungs. Lucifer recognized the confusion in his friends’ features, but he wasn’t sure he completely understood it himself enough to explain it to them.</p><p>Twice in one day. Twice, the most important people for him had been too close to danger because of him. </p><p>“How are you still alive? No one leaves. <em>No one escapes</em>.” The worry in his voice was palpable and he quickly stepped towards her, worrying and scanning her for injuries.</p><p>“Maybe because I’m awesome.” She tried, but it sounded too forced to ease his concerns.</p><p>“How did you find him?”  Lucifer found himself asking, his curiosity getting the best of him. “The Family’s been trying to find him for years now, but no one could ever do it. It was a miracle they found me when I was captured.” He saw her freeze for the second time that night, and like before, the hidden meaning of his words didn’t go unnoticed by him. “<em>Unless</em> you knew how to look, where to look.”</p><p>The silence in the room was deafening. Between tense stances and worried looks, the only thing Lucifer could see was the fear in Maze’s eyes. The unsteady thumping of his heart was maddening.</p><p>“<em>How did you find him, Maze? </em>” He asked again, wanting to believe he was wrong. Needing to believe he was wrong. Otherwise, it would mean…</p><p>It would mean she’d betrayed him.</p><p>“Lucifer…” </p><p>“You knew he was here before I even told you about it, didn’t you?” Lucifer asked, and he saw his answer in her eyes. The guilt so obvious in her features only made his insides cringe. But he refused to believe in it. “How did you know?”</p><p>“I can explain…” She began, taking another step forward, but one look from him and she stopped her advance. She knew when to thread carefully with his anger.</p><p>“Then explain!” Lucifer burst, startling everyone in the room. “Because the only way I see it is if you knew him…” He shared slowly, hurt slipping into his tone, too strong for him to even try to hide it. Seeing the pain flare up in her features, the hesitant step back, the drop of her gaze, made the world sway out from under his feet.</p><p>“All this time... you’re a demon, aren’t you?” He dared to speak it, this sordid, dark thought haunting his mind. To put into words the monster gnawing at his stomach.</p><p>He wasn’t prepared for the confirmation he found in her eyes.</p><p>“No! I’m not, not anymore! I got out, I swear.” Maze was openly pleading, the pain in her eyes so evident, so much like the one he carried inside himself, but Lucifer couldn’t seem to care. It was like the switch of his emotions had been turned off, leaving him alone with numbness. Maze stepped forward one more time, her hands raised in a placating manner. “You have to believe me. I only went to look for him because I thought he might be in town to hurt us.” She tried to explain, but Lucifer had difficulty paying attention to her words, his own mind swimming in an infinitude of thoughts.</p><p>“You know, I could never figure out why my last mission failed so spectacularly.” He interrupted her, the hollowness he felt inside himself echoing his crescent hurt. “No one was supposed to know I was there. Only the Family knew, but they wouldn’t have betrayed me back then.” His tone became thoughtful as he spoke, the pain seemingly gone on the outside. Lucifer could see in her eyes she knew where he was leading, even if the three intruders seemed as lost as Lucifer felt. “But you knew. I was stupid enough to tell you a couple weeks before it happened. It was you, wasn’t it? They knew I was there because of you.”</p><p>“I didn’t know it would be you! You only said that base was going to be breached and that your Family needed the information. You never told me it would be you doing it!” Maze exclaimed, the desperation in her voice fleeting from her control. “If I had known it would be you-”</p><p>“How could you do this to me?” Lucifer’s voice was low, carried deep with hurt. He thought it would drown him, all this pain he had inside him that didn’t seem capable to stop expanding. It felt as it had when his family had betrayed him, only worse now because he’d been betrayed again. Because he should’ve known better. Because he considered her highly than he’d ever had his family.</p><p>“Because you weren’t the only one looking for a way out!” Maze burst out, shocking them both into silence. The quietness that stretched on between them seemed unsurpassable, unlike anything that had ever been between them. “He said he’d let me walk away after that.” She said when she found her voice again.</p><p>“But he didn’t, did he?” Lucifer half asked, half stated, his voice as defeated as her had sounded.</p><p>“No.” Maze confessed in a somber tone, her eyes refusing to meet his. A scoff escaped his lips, and his mouth tasted bitter with betrayal. “At least not until we moved here. He hasn’t contacted me ever since.”</p><p>A long silence grew around the two of them, Lucifer painfully staring at her while Maze couldn’t seem to be able to lift her eyes from the floor. It made him wish he had scotch, if not to drown his sorrows with it, at least to wash away the horrible taste out of his tongue.</p><p>“How long?” Lucifer broke the silence, disrupting the quiet peace with his trembling voice. He wasn’t sure he wanted to know, but the question was out of his lips before he could think better about it. “How long were you selling me out?” </p><p>When she finally looked back up at him, and he saw the pain in her eyes, Lucifer knew it had been a mistake. He would be better off not knowing. “Since day one.” Maze confessed, and he felt like vomiting. “It’s why I approached you in the first place.”</p><p>Lucifer silently retreated back to the window, keeping his back to her as he tried to fight away the tears that began flooding his eyes and threatened to spill down his cheeks.</p><p>“I know I betrayed you in the beginning, but after we got close, I tried to stop it. I swear.” He heard her stepping closer until felt her standing just behind him, but Lucifer couldn’t quite move, or believe in the words leaving her lips. “After all your talks of wanting to be free from the agency and be your own person and how we didn’t live in the real world and <em>free will</em>… it made me wish I could be free, too.”</p><p>“If you wanted to get out, why would you go looking for Command now?” He asked back without turning around, his voice thick with emotion.</p><p>“Because I didn’t want you to know he was here. Because I knew what it would do to you. I thought that maybe I could stop him before he found you.” Maze pressed on, and this time he couldn’t ignore the genuineness of her words. “Obviously it didn’t work out.”</p><p>Lucifer turned around slowly, locking eyes with her. His still glistening with unshed tears while hers were filled with fear and doubt. He didn’t understand her, <em>couldn’t</em> understand her.</p><p>He didn’t even understand himself.</p><p>Lucifer didn’t know what to feel or how to feel it, and it made him wish the Doctor was there as well. He could see why she had done what she had done, at least in the beginning, but it didn’t stop it for hurting him. He recognized the logic, he just didn’t think he’d have it in himself to do that.</p><p>“So, what do we do now?” Daniel asked, breaking the heavy atmosphere with his annoyance, and scrambling with Lucifer’s train of thought. It made him even more confused about what he felt as if his feelings weren’t scattered all over the place already. He sensed everyone’s eyes on him, and it made him silently panic. He couldn’t think properly or emotion properly at the moment, so how was he supposed to know what to do? “If your brothers really were behind Chloe’s accident, then maybe we should lay low.” Daniel continued, oblivious to Lucifer’s inner turmoil.</p><p>The conversation picked up around him easily after that, but Lucifer didn’t take part in it. He couldn’t focus on anything else, he felt too numb inside to even care about himself anymore.</p><p>Life would be much easier, and definitely much shorter, but most certainly more painful, if he simply surrounded himself to his brothers. But in the back of his mind he knew it wouldn’t be something the Detective would be happy with, and she’d somehow find a way to put an end to him and his nonsense.</p><p>“Lucifer. Lucifer?” He only came back to himself minutes later, when he heard the Detective calling for him. He blinked his eyes back into focus and forced himself to pay attention to her. She was standing in front of him, her free hand resting on his forearm, her thumb running back and forth over his jacket. “We’ll take you up on that safe house after all.”</p><p>He nodded and they began making plans. Lucifer tried to participate and voice his opinions, but he would frequently lose himself to his thoughts. After agreeing that it would be best if they moved during the night, the Detective got up and went to her bedroom to pack her things, but Maze stayed behind.</p><p>“You, too, Maze.” Lucifer said, his voice still feeling off. She, as well as Daniel and Ms. Lopez, had matching shock expressions on. “I don’t leave people behind.”</p>
<hr/><p>The Corvette’s door creaked as Lucifer closed it, the sand shifting beneath the soles of his shoes as he walked out of his car. He breathed in the smell of the ocean, of damp sand, of the clear morning air, away from the pollution of the downtown, and felt peace for the first time in weeks.</p><p>The sun was just now breaking over the horizon, casting its first rays in Los Angeles, softly illuminating his beach house. It wasn’t anything as impressive as Lux’s building, or as awe inspiring and breathtaking as some of the modern houses one would expect to find in LA.</p><p>This house was soft, somehow. Warm, familiar, personal. It was… home, for the lack of a better word.</p><p>The wooden exterior mingled well with the small nature around, while the white was posh and refined. </p><p>The passenger seat door of the Corvette creaked as the Detective closed it, and Lucifer turned around just in time to catch her smile as she contemplated the house. He couldn’t help but notice how beautiful she looked in the soft morning light, and he gave her a genuine smile when her eyes turned to meet his.</p><p>For a second, it almost looked normal. For a second he got to pretend they were there to simply enjoy the beach, as a vacation or maybe just a little get away from the craziness of police work and the city. But a couple more doors closing sounded behind them as another car was turned off, and Lucifer was painfully reminded of the reason they were there.</p><p>They were running from life, <em>for</em> their lives. Something he had never wished upon any of them.</p><p>“It’s a nice house.” The Detective said as she approached him, an easy smile lighting up her features.</p><p>Lucifer offered her a smile in return and reached out to take the duffel bag from her hands without much protest from her. He swung the strap over his shoulder and made way for the front door as the others joined them, a nagging feeling consuming his stomach with every step forward he took.</p><p>“I’m surprised you haven’t gotten rid of this place yet. You have like three other beach houses that fit your style much more than this one does.” Maze commented as she walked closer, turning around to examine the front of the house with clear distaste.</p><p>Of course the beach house didn’t fit ‘Lucifer Morningstar’s’ style. It was too home-y, and soft, and warm, and dreamlike. But it wasn’t ‘Lucifer Morningstar’ that had bought it.</p><p>“I haven’t ‘gotten rid’ of it and I don’t plan to.” His tone had been maybe stiffer than he’d been aiming for, and both the Detective and Doctor Linda – who had been brought up to speed with everything just to be safe – shifted to eye him curiously.</p><p>Lucifer made quick work of the front lock and carefully disabled all the security systems before stepping into the house and being washed away with this feeling of home he only ever got there.</p><p>It was a sweet thing, a relaxed wave that took over him. But deep down, he couldn’t stop being wary, always looking around, just waiting for the smoke to rise, for the fire to burn him down again.</p><p>His eyes scanned the open space, glad to notice everything had been left exactly where it was the last time he’d been there. It had been years since he’d last visited, but the house still smelled as it had in his memories.</p><p>Lucifer turned on the lights as he made his way to the living room to drop the Detective’s duffel bag on the couch. The others trailed behind him, shyly, slowly taking in the place.</p><p>His fingers traveled over the lid of the baby grand piano he had there, most certainly out of tune by now. A thin layer of dust covered the glossy black paint, and had it been any other day, Lucifer would’ve had a heart attack. Now he was just happy it’d give him something to occupy his mind with.</p><p>He continued to reach out to furniture and objects as he made his way to the kitchen. His fingers drifted over the white quartz countertops and the blue cabinets as he watched his friends settle in on the living room, more than one pair of eyes curiously studying the stairs by the corner of the open room.</p><p>Lucifer needed some time for himself, to gather his scattered thoughts, put them into order. He hadn’t bought this house for its style or the location or its uniqueness. He had bought it for the feelings it spurred on him, for the memories he’d had once in a beach house much like this one. But in that moment, those feelings were too much for him.</p><p>He was still trying to rationalize the Detective’s accident, and it wasn’t easy having five people invade a space that had been only his for years, a space that held too much consideration to him.</p><p>So, he decided to stick to the sidelines for the moment, to give himself some time to digest all that was happening in small bits.</p><p>The Detective eventually approached him, not cowered by his intense staring. She simply leaned on the counter by his side, content to just watch the others with him. It was soothing, somehow. Her presence, there, rock solid, constantly by his side.</p><p>Her hand slowly raised to press at her injured arm, now free of the sling, as casually as she could, but little about her escaped Lucifer’s radar lately. The sight of her soft features flinching in pain but trying to hide it…</p><p>It was wrong, deeply so. It settled as a wave of nausea on Lucifer’s stomach, turning that nagging sensation into a tight ball of anguish that pressed into his insides.</p><p>He’d like to remember as little as he could about the night before, about the accident, about getting that call, about arriving there... He’d only felt that dread a handful of times before in his life, and he was not keen in repeating it.</p><p>So, in a stupid attempt to get that out of his mind, he decided to blurt out poorly thought through words. Which, by now, were his trademark.</p><p>“This house was the first thing I bought when I arrived in LA.”</p><p>Lucifer’s eyes widened as he heard himself, his heartbeats spiking in response. The Detective shifted by his side, turning to face him more fully, her features inquiring but not privy.</p><p>“Even before Lux?” She asked, her voice soft. </p><p>It was easier talking about it when they were alone, when there weren’t four other people taking over his living room. Four people he’d invited over, nonetheless. So, Lucifer only offered her a nod, turning to lock his eyes with hers and a futile attempt to pretend the others didn’t exist.</p><p>“You have a thing with beaches, don’t you?”</p><p>Lucifer let out a happy huff, getting caught off guard by her question. He offered her a tiny, tentative smile as he thought about it.</p><p>He’d usually come to the beach when he wanted to be alone, or when he wanted to think. A beach was where he’d been broken down and where he’d been reborn. It was the only tie he had to his past, to his childhood, to when things were simple.</p><p>The beach was also the place he’d kissed her for the first time.</p><p>They spoke to him deeply for some reason, the vastness, the all-encompassing quietude. He’d taken the Detective to the beach various times, eager – and yet dreading – to share this side of him with her, be it to watch a couple sunsets with him, for a summer walk by the sea, or to that special seafood restaurant on the sand overlooking the calm waves.</p><p>“I guess I do.”</p><p>The Detective nudged his shoulder with hers, a soft smile playing around her features. It made Lucifer relax for the first time in too long.</p><p>Slowly, he got up from the counter he was leaning on, motioning for the Detective to follow him with a nod. He made his way to the big French doors that stood proudly in the middle of the room and opened them, letting the sea breeze gently pass through him to fill the entire room.</p><p>The Detective took in a surprised gasp by his side, slowly sidestepping him to move to the porch that stretched out in front of them. The sun was still crawling its way up the sky, but the first rays were shining on the sea, making it glint like a diamond as the light caught on the slight movements of the water.</p><p>Lucifer stepped forward and joined the Detective, leaning his forearms on the balustrade. He breathed in, letting the rich smell of the moist sand take over his senses.</p><p>Soon, his friends started joining them on the porch, but slowly, Lucifer had started to accept their presence, instead of recoiling from the sudden intrusion.</p><p>“Dude, this place is <em>amazing</em>. Why would you live in the middle of the city with all that noise when you could live <em>here</em>?” Ms. Lopez asked excitedly as she took in the stretch of sand in front of them and the sea beyond.</p><p>Her question, on the other hand, slowly wore Lucifer’s newfound ease off. The Detective tried to hide, but it was painfully obvious how the question had affected him and how she’d shifted as well, supportive in case he needed, but still curious to hear his answer.</p><p>Doctor Linda also seemed to pick up on it, and her shift of attention was smoother, but no less obvious. </p><p>At least Daniel seemed to remain painfully oblivious to all of it while Maze was nowhere in sight.</p><p>Lucifer let out a sigh, feeling the answer physically weighting down in his chest. It wasn’t despair this time, it was simply longing. And the sea, which was meant to be his refuge, wasn’t comforting.</p><p>“Living here... It would hurt too much.” </p><p>His voice remained strangely leveled, and his answer was cryptic enough to warrant all eyes to continue to look at him in question. Particularly, it wouldn’t be something he’d like to share. He’d already shared so much...</p><p>There was little he could do to stop Ms. Lopez from eyeing him with some degree of pity, or the Detective to ever stop worrying or caring for him because of his past, or maybe despite of it. The Doctor would certainly pester him enough to talk about it at his next session.</p><p>Might as well go all in while he’s at it.</p><p>Lucifer let out a deep sigh, closing his eyes to search through the confines of his mind for the time happiness was something other than just another word to him. “The only memory I have of my real family is in a place much like this one.” Lucifer shared, feeling the heaviness of grief slurring his words.</p><p>His past had always been a difficult subject, even when being a spy wasn’t yet his past. The fragmented memories he had as a result of his training in the Academy had always haunted him. Be it with what if’s or deaths far more tragic than fire or loneliness.</p><p>The change in his mood felt almost physical. The Detective also shifted by his side, coming to press her side to his. It was comforting, grounding, warm. It was what he needed. Support and space to get his thoughts straight. But she was a detective in the end, and it wasn’t in her nature to go on with unanswered questions.</p><p>“Your name...” She started tentatively, and he let out a sigh. Deep down, he’d always known she’d eventually figure that one out. Knowing didn’t make him any better prepared, though. “You’re Lucifer now, and your brothers called you, uh... Samael. But that’s not your birth name, is it?” The Detective finally asked, struggling with her words until the very last one, weighting his reactions as she spoke.</p><p>In the end she was right, more than he’d like her to be.</p><p>“No, it isn’t.” Lucifer confessed with a pained sigh, staring at the sea for one last time, taking in all the comfort and the strength it could give him. </p><p>When he turned to her, tears had already started to prickle his eyes, the pain of forgetfulness consuming him whole. “I don’t- I- I don’t know… I don’t… I don’t remember what it was.” His voice was thick, his emotions getting carried away and out of his grasp. The horrified surprise that dawned on the Detective’s features made his contort in pain. “The training. They... they make you forget who- who you were and I- <em>I don’t remember</em>.”</p><p>The words broke him, they broke the damn that was poorly holding his feelings at bay. Lucifer couldn’t handle it. It was too much, he was too broken. Too many pieces he couldn’t hold together anymore.</p><p>The silence that stretched around him was louder than the myriad of thoughts haunting his mind. He could feel all eyes on him, pitying and judging and making assumptions and treating him differently now.</p><p>That was exactly the opposite of what Lucifer wanted, and he refused to acknowledge that the broken sound that left his lips was a sob. </p><p>Next thing he knew, all the weight of the stares lifted as his friends left him alone with his thoughts, but not the Detective. Lucifer found himself with her wrapped around him, her arms reaching up to wrap around his shoulders, one of her hands tangling up in his wind-blown hair.</p><p>Her head was a nice weight in his shoulder, and her warmth… so close to him, to his heart, to his soul… It didn’t take him long to melt into her, for his arms to wrap around her waist, for him to pull her closer, and his next shaky breaths were drowned by her hair as an ocean poured out of him.</p>
<hr/><p>The house was mostly dark when he sneaked out into the night, a cloak of shadows hiding his steps and his intentions.</p><p>Lucifer knew it was incredibly stupid of him, but he’d already made up his mind.  They were too important to him, <em>she</em> was too important for him to just sit around and wait for his brothers to come and ruin everything.</p><p>He’d be coming to them this time.</p><p>In the dead of night, with only the stars to witness, Lucifer left the house, the supposed safe haven, where he could be safe for a while and at home and <em>with her</em>, to consciously walk into his death trap.</p>
<hr/><p>Lucifer took a deep drag from his current cigarette and blew out the smoke, watching as it danced in the cold, crispy night air until it eventually disappeared. The brick wall steady behind his back was moist, the light from the streetlamp nearby too bright for his taste, but exactly placed to provide him the cover of darkness.</p><p>The alleyway beside Lux was cleaner than most alleys in Los Angeles, but ‘cleaner than most’ wasn’t the same as clean, which still meant filthy in Lucifer’s book. It had probably been Michael’s idea of a funny joke, to make him wait for his end in the worst possible place with his perfectly clean penthouse just around the corner.</p><p>Lucifer wrinkled his nose as he took in his surroundings one more time. The faint noise from Lux filled the air, mixing in with the traffic at Sunset Avenue despite the late hour to create the intoxicating, big party city atmosphere LA was known for. When Lucifer looked up, the lights from the city were much too bright for him to even hope to see the stars.</p><p>He took in another deep drag from his cigarette and slowly blew out the smoke, trying in vain to calm his nerves as he heard two sets of footsteps approaching him.</p><p>“Nice to see you’ve come to reason, Sammy.” Michael’s voice drifted through the air, overly pleased with himself, a sickly smirk pulling at his lips. His steps were sure as he stepped out of the shadows and into the light in the alley with Amenadiel trailing behind in a coldly detachment that was his trademark.</p><p>Lucifer put out his cigarette with the tip of his shoe, standing up straight and turning towards his approaching brothers with distaste clear in his features. “Well, you didn’t give me much of a choice, did you?” His tone was cold as the words spat out of him, with a dark sense of confidence taking over his hasty, anxious heartbeats.</p><p>Michael scoffed and turned around to gauge Amenadiel’s reaction, clearly expecting the same kind of mockery surprise as if what Lucifer had said was the funniest thing in the world. Amenadiel, on the other hand, seemed as annoyed by Michael’s antics at this false victory as Lucifer was. </p><p>They were both still in casual clothes, which alerted Lucifer to the fact that they weren’t planning on going after Command immediately, which kind of ruined his plans of dealing with this mess as quickly as possible and returning before the Detective noticed his absence.</p><p>“Well, if you’d quit being an idiot and done the job you were assigned to, then your precious detective wouldn’t have suffered the consequences.” Michael’s grin, which could only be described as positively evil and wicked, stretched out over his lips, showing too many teeth in its wake for Lucifer to feel comfortable with.</p><p>His hands tightened into fists by his side, itching to connect with Michael’s jaw, maybe with his nose, to leave a bloodied mark in his face and make him pay for hurting his Detective. Instead, Lucifer breathed out through gritted teeth, walking the extra mile to try to control the fire inside him that was turning his vision red with rage, and stop the nausea from settling in his stomach.</p><p>He would save the beat up for later. It would accomplish him nothing right now, only hindering the progress of their hunt and keeping him away from her for longer. Michael had better chances of knocking him down to his ass, but it wouldn’t stop Lucifer from trying, and it certainly didn’t stop his mind from imagining all the ways he could hurt Michael in return. </p><p>It was no coincidence he’d named himself after the Devil.</p><p>“At least we know you can control your temper tantrums now, Sammy.” Michael continued, overtly pleased as he walked by Lucifer, placing a condescending hand onto his shoulder. “I should’ve pulled this detective card sooner. We could’ve been back in England by now. But at least now you know what happens if you disobey your orders.”</p><p>Michael’s threat rang loud in the air, making a freezing chill run all the way down Lucifer’s spine. But whatever fears his threat might have carried were quickly consumed by the fires of Lucifer’s rage. The cynical smile stretching all the way to his twin’s eyes was just the last drop Lucifer needed to burst.</p><p>“<em>Don’t you dare touch her</em>.” The words left his lips in a feral growl, otherworldly, deep and primal. It made even Michael take a step back as Lucifer strode forward, the fire taking over his vision almost making his eyes glow bright red. He could feel the flames consuming him, reigning over him, turning him into every bit of the Devil he claimed to be.</p><p>It took a second for Amenadiel to break through from his shock, but once he did, he firmly planted himself in Lucifer’s path, a strong hand in his chest stopping him from ripping Michael to shreds.</p><p>“That’s enough with you two.” He roared, his voice commanding like Father’s used to be, but it did little to stop Lucifer from trying to launch forward again. </p><p>This time, Amenadiel pushed him more forcefully into the wall he’d been leaning onto only moments ago. The off put bricks collided straight into his scars, making Lucifer wince, and briefly let the fire out of his eyes.</p><p>All air rushed out of his lungs, and for an excruciatingly long second, Lucifer couldn’t draw breath as a shot of pain seared through his soul, but his suffering went unnoticed by his brothers, too focused on each other as they had always been.</p><p>It took Lucifer a second to realize they were arguing, and about him, nonetheless. He tried to get angry, to gather back the fire that lived inside him, but the constant throbbing in his back always made him lose focus. </p><p>And the pain there was growing and growing and growing, from a constant dull ache into a sharp, scorching pain that would have him cringing into himself in mere minutes. He knew it was mostly psychological, but there was nothing he could do to stop it once it began.</p><p>“Stop this now, Michael.” Amenadiel commanded again, but this time Michael turned away with a distasteful scoff, seemingly resigned for the moment. “You two are brothers, <em>twins</em>, for Fathers sake! If you want to do this, then you two will have to find a way to work together.” </p><p>Lucifer fixed his eyes on Michael’s who was staring back at him with the same distasteful gaze. The only difference between the twins was the effort Lucifer was making to hide his pain. Only half of his mind was focused on his brothers, the other half lost to the agony of his past.</p><p>“Ok, then. Now, let’s go.” Amenadiel announced and swiftly turned to walk away, with Michael shortly following after him.</p><p>Lucifer made sure to keep some good space between the three of them, to make sure he’d be able to react when his brothers inevitably turned on him.</p><p>“Where are we going, exactly?” He forced himself to ask despite knowing that chances were he wouldn’t be getting a proper answer.</p><p>“Somewhere we can talk in private.”</p>
<hr/><p>“As I said before, <em>I don’t know where he is!</em>”</p><p>Lucifer gritted out the words, his fist hitting the table he was trapped at as he lost control of his temper for a second. They’d been at this for hours now, the sun already shining on whatever hope he’d had that he’d be able to return to the beach house before anyone noticed he was missing.</p><p>It had been a stupid thought since the beginning. As if his greatest fear could be resolved in the short span of a few hours. But after leaving that alley, Amenadiel and Michael had shoved him into a small room, completely unremarkable, and extra tight and bright. Stupid thoughts were all Lucifer had to fight back against his growing anxiety.</p><p>This wasn’t a prison, no matter how much his siblings seemed like jailers at the moment. It was more of an interrogation room, much like the ones they had at the precinct. With the center table, and the tiring lights, and the flooding amount of questions.</p><p>Lucifer wasn’t used to being on this side of the table, the side of the criminals. He was used to being the one doing the interrogation with the Detective by his side. To being the one to bend the suspects to his will of truth and seek out punishment when deserved.</p><p>And not... to being the one restlessly accused of something that was obvious he couldn’t know.</p><p>“I told you he’d be useless. Are you sure we still need him?” Michael asked, not exactly caring for whatever answer Amenadiel had to give him. It seemed his mind was already made up on Lucifer’s lack of utility.</p><p>One look from Amenadiel had Michael rolling his eyes with a distasteful scoff as he retreated to the corner he’d been lurking on for the past hour. Amenadiel used the moment to approach Lucifer, with a caring and a calming sort of softness to his features that screamed deceit loudly at Lucifer’s face. </p><p>“Look, Sam. You just have to try harder. Command had you for two and a half months. You <em>must</em> know something.” He pressed in what Lucifer was sure he thought was encouraging but was creepy instead. </p><p>The soft edge didn’t fit Amenadiel’s style. Too many muscles building his frame, so much cold filling his eyes. He was a rock, an <em>impersonal</em> rock. Without feelings and temper reactions. He always gave off an air of personal detachment that just made it extra harder for Lucifer to allow him into his thoughts.</p><p>It hadn’t always been like this. To a complete stranger, Lucifer was sure he seemed like the stoic, solid rock that could harbor you during a storm. Lucifer was sure his brother appeared unthreatening and trustworthy with his silky smiles and his honeyed voice. But for him, it was hard to forget the day Amenadiel had finally burst. That one time he’d let his anger reign over.</p><p>That time where Samael had been too close to him to notice. That time Amenadiel had beat him to a pulp, Sam’s blood staining his face, his hands soaked in it, the feral glint that had taken over his eyes…</p><p>Amenadiel was the oldest, the first son, their mentor, their friend. The one that should have helped and protected them. Instead, he’d let his own anger out on Samael, and that was a memory that no matter how hard he tried, Lucifer would never be able to forget. It would always be there when he closed his eyes, tattooed in the back of his lids.</p><p>“He had me as a <em>prisoner</em>, Amenadiel. <em>Prisoners</em> don’t get any information.” Lucifer spat. He felt bile rising up his throat, bringing a sour taste to his mouth that mixed with the words he was fighting to keep to himself. All the pain and the torture he was trying to forget, and that his brothers had no trouble bringing up again and again for hours on end. “And as I said before, the name’s <em>Lucifer</em>.”</p><p>“At least try, <em>Lucifer</em>. Just one more time. You know more than you realize.” Amenadiel pressed again, getting closer and closer to the chair Lucifer was currently occupying, the intensity of his gaze growing as he stepped forward.</p><p>Lucifer let out a pained breath and closed his eyes, leaning his elbows on the table and dropping his head to his hands. This was such a <em>monumental</em> waste of time that Lucifer couldn’t fight against, not as long as Amenadiel was keen that it was the way to go.</p><p>So once again, he scratched the dam, damaging the barrier that separated his trauma from his conscientious mind. His carefully crafted walls crumbled down all at once as a flood of black and white flashbacks came forth.</p><p>Loneliness, and the dark, and cold, and fear. The one common denominator in all of them: <em>pain</em>.</p><p>His breaths were shaky, all the terrible feelings and the worst memories he had coming forth all at once, and Lucifer felt like he couldn’t breathe. His anxiety reactions spiked up, heartbeats so loud he could barely hear anything else. </p><p>Except the screams. Those were always there.</p><p>“<em>I can’t</em>.” He said, <em>pleaded</em>, his words caught in a choked gasp. His head felt light and his grasp in reality thinned as the flashes became increasingly more frequent until he thought he’d throw up.</p><p>They just couldn’t <em>understand</em>. They didn’t know what he’d gone through, what it had done to him. <em>No one knew</em>.</p><p>It was just him, just Lucifer. Alone again.</p><p>“No one could ever find him, but no one had ever survived his torture. <em>You did</em>. The only reason you’re here is that, <em>Lucifer</em>. So, you either make yourself useful and figure out how Command hides, or we’ll get rid of you.”</p><p>Michael’s stepped echoed in the small room, making Lucifer flinch every time his shoe hit the ground. He was commanding in his approach, his stance sure and filled with the righteous, almost divine, wrath of his angelic namesake. His posture was commanding, the fear he stirred as well, but Lucifer was more fearful of his past.</p><p>He shook his head repeatedly, closing his eyes and pressing his thumbs to his temples. No matter how hard he tried to hide, Lucifer would never truly be free of his memories, but it wouldn’t stop him from trying.</p><p>He couldn’t do this; he couldn’t force himself to remember whatever it was Amenadiel thought he knew. Lucifer couldn’t go through this again, not alone, not accompanied, not for a hunt, or a mission, or in this case to put an end to all the suffering he’d been through. To put an end to the one that had scarred him forever.</p><p>He just couldn’t. Not for some slim chance he might know where Command had hid years before. Lucifer couldn’t break himself, not when he knew he wouldn’t be able to gather the pieces back together, for some slim chance to find inexistent information in his mess of memories.</p><p>With his mind made up, all he had to do was find a way out of the hole of memories his brothers had forced him into.</p><p>Easier said than done.</p><p>Lucifer tried to calm his breathing, to massage his headache away, to focus on his heartbeats, to connect himself to the world around him, to get a grasp in reality. To pull at his hair and dig his nails in his scalp in the hopes pain would bring his mind back to his body.</p><p>It all failed. All he was left with was closing his mind’s eye to focus on the feeling.</p><p>It was hard to conjure up a beach in the beginning, so Lucifer decided to start small. First were the sounds of distant waves crashing on the shore, then the grains of sand prickling the sensitive skin of his feet and ankles, then the wind ruffling his hair and the smell of salt that filled the air. Then the sun, warming his skin.</p><p>Slowly, he built a beach around himself. He tried to think of waves, of the sea and sunshine, but the only image that came to his mind was her. Glowing brighter than the morning sun, lighting up the darkness and making even the stars jealous of her glow.</p><p>The crashing waves molding the strands framing her face, her eyes of a stormy, ocean blue, her golden hair capturing the sunshine, her tanned skin the same color of the golden sand. Chloe always stole his breath away.</p><p>Every memory of happiness Lucifer had was at a beach. His childhood, his family, leisure strolls on a summer afternoon, a kiss. And among all the others, there she was, his Detective, his happiness, his friend, his light, standing brighter than ever before. No distant memory of his held a spark to the mere sight of her.  </p><p>At long last a small smile started growing on his lips, and Lucifer allowed himself to open his eyes, his mind more centered in himself than it had ever been before.</p><p>“I don’t know where Command might be hiding, or how to find him.” He shared, his tone final, but with a calmness he hadn’t felt in days. Not even Michael’s impatient huff or his undignified scoffs, or even Amenadiel’s pitying gaze were enough to trouble him, to steer Lucifer away from the clarity he’d finally found within himself. “But I might know someone who might.”</p>
<hr/><p>It was pointless. It was difficult, and time consuming, and boring, but mostly just pointless. Even with a forced retirement, it wasn’t like Lucifer had forgotten about how to be a spy. There was no chance he’d be found unless he wanted to.</p><p>Not that it seemed to matter for Decker or the others.</p><p>The detective had been pacing around nonstop since they’d noticed Lucifer was gone, and it was starting to get on Maze’s nerves.</p><p>She was always checking and rechecking her phone and a computer Ellen had brought with her, hoping beyond hope that it might ping with his phone’s location at any moment. There was nothing more pointless than hope.</p><p>And it would’ve been pathetic, had Maze not been doing the same thing.</p><p>Of course, Lucifer had been shortsighted and had rushed into decisions and was probably going to get himself killed. She’d come to expect that of him, even before when he used to be reckless for a living.</p><p>Only this time… This time, the threat was real, and it was coming from both sides.</p><p>This time Lucifer didn’t have a team with him, didn’t have back up, didn’t have whatever mission command crap spies had. He only had traitors beside him, and his worst nightmare in front of him.</p><p>For the first time in her life, Maze found herself praying to whatever god who was out there and gave the tiniest bit of crap to weight the sides on Lucifer’s favor. Just this once. He’d need every bit of luck he could get.</p><p>When Decker’s phone finally rang, Maze felt like she was going to explode with all the pent-up tension taking over her muscles. Chloe stepped aside to take it, typing on the computer as she talked to some Terry guy from the IT department at the precinct.</p><p>Boring, and most certainly unhelpful.</p><p>Maze scoffed as she let her eyes fall back to the screen Ellen was working on. At least that seemed more promising, even if she was comparing it to a sure failure from Decker’s guy.</p><p>Of course, none of it would help. Only Lucifer could help himself now. Not that any of the others recognized that.</p><p>Her phone vibrated with an incoming text and Maze shifted around to read it, purposefully blocking Dan’s view of it. She’d reached out to some of her... <em>less legal</em> contacts on the streets in a last attempt to find Lucifer, something the law-abiding detectives would probably yell at her for, or at least frown upon.</p><p>Not something she was really keen on bearing at the moment.</p><p>Maze stood up in a hurry when she read the text and quietly made her way to the porch once she recognized the number on her screen was from ‘Eden’, Lux’s counterpart in Las Vegas.</p><p>The phone rang just as she rounded a corner, a cheerful voice flooding out of the speaker the second she accepted the call.</p><p>“Maze! How’s my favorite demon doing in this fine afternoon, hmm?”</p><p>“Lucifer? You idiot, where the hell are you?” She shout-whispered into the phone, all her frustration and annoyance, and her fear for his life – even if she fervently denied the latter – coming to surface at the same time. “Decker’s assembled a small army to find you.”</p><p>“Well, there’s no need for that. I assure you I’m perfectly fine.” He tried to reassure her, but that asshole’s fake cheerfulness only hinted to what fears Maze knew were haunting him. “Now, I’m pretty sure you know why I slipped away in the middle of the night, but it appears I might have hit a dead end. So, if you could just get me you-know-who’s location so I can put an end to this...”</p><p>“Fuck, Lucifer...” Maze swore, her tone lower than a whisper. No matter how much she wanted to yell at the idiot, alerting Decker to this would only make things worse. “This is crazy. I’m not helping you to get yourself killed.”</p><p>“Come on, Maze! I’m not going to get mys-”</p><p>“Yes, you are. And you know it.” She interrupted, silencing whatever denial he’d built to justify this crazy act to himself. “Trusting your brothers? They won’t have your back. They’ll probably kill you once you’ve dealt with Command. I won’t help you, no.”</p><p>“You owe me, Maze.” His voice was somber, darker than she’d ever heard it before, all the emotion that was so defining of him gone in a split second. </p><p>She tried to swallow the guilt, but her betrayal formed a lump inside her throat that threatened to cut her air supply every time she acknowledged it.</p><p>“Lucifer... <em>please</em>, don’t make me do this...” Her voice wavered as it left her lips, an insecurity coloring her tone that was so foreign to her, it made her tremble. She’d never had to plead with him, not like this, not before last night.</p><p>And for some reason, she felt she would never stop pleading with him from now on.</p><p>“There’s no other way.” The resignation in his voice was palpable, even through the static of the speaker. Maze could almost picture him, with his shoulders slumped and that glow gone from his eyes.</p><p>Just as he’d had been after the bomb.</p><p>“There <em>has</em> to be.”</p><p>“Not this time, Maze. You know it just as much as I do.” Lucifer let out a pained sigh before he quieted, letting the static fill the space between them as he tried to put his thoughts in order. “He didn’t just destroy our lives, Maze. He destroyed everything we were. It’ll be only a matter of time before he finds out about the Detective, and Beatrice, and Linda…”</p><p>Maze let out an annoyed huff, but no matter how hard she wanted to fight back, she knew Lucifer was right.</p><p>“I can’t let him destroy us again, and them along the way.”</p><p>“Fine. Give me a couple of hours and I’ll text you his location.” Silence stretched on between them. She wasn’t sure why they didn’t say anything to each other and yet refused to hang up.</p><p>She wanted to say… <em>things</em> to him and maybe he did, too. But mostly, Maze just wished he was there so she could slap some sense into his idiotic, pretty head.</p><p>“Just don’t tell Decker about my part in this. She’ll rip my head off for causing your funeral.” Was what she said instead. She felt he’d understood what she meant, but the line went silent too soon for her to be certain.</p>
<hr/><p>
  <em>Motion.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>He was being pushed forward. A tight grip on his wrist making him lose balance and move forward if he wanted to keep standing.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>Then it hit him, in his back, a cold piercing his flesh and making the blood pour out of him.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>There was a burst of pain, blinding and air sucking, and he lost the strength to keep himself up.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>The ground was cool beneath his feverish skin, and for a second, it was relieving. The blood caking his shirt was now pooling around him. The pain made his entire being shake convulsively as the night closed in around him.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>Out of all the possibilities, this wasn’t the ending Lucifer had wanted for himself. </em>
</p>
<hr/><p>So out in the less populated areas of Los Angeles, Lucifer could almost see the stars.</p><p>He’d been trying to find them all night long, his mind lost in the sky as he hid atop some nearby building, pretending to be okay with this plan. It could be his end, his last hour on earth, and he had so, so many regrets...</p><p>But missing out on the stars wouldn’t be one of them.</p><p>“There... can you see it?” Amenadiel broke the quiet, his posture changing as he pointed to whatever it was that had caught his attention.</p><p>Whatever it was, it didn’t matter much to Lucifer. It only meant his time was running out, and it meant he’d definitely not get to see her again.</p><p>
  <em>So many regrets... </em>
</p><p>“Ok, this is it. Be ready to move in five.” Michael commanded, getting up from his position overlooking the building Command was using as a hideout and going to gear up. “There’s an opening in the ceiling. We can use it to get in without them noticing it. We’ll wait until the guards outside restart their rounds and then breach in.”</p><p>Amenadiel got up and went to grab his own gear. Holstering a weapon to his thigh and his more common gear into a tactic belt that soon went around his waist.</p><p>Lucifer, on the other hand, decided to forego whatever bullshit they’d wanted him to wear and had chosen to remain with his Prada suit of armor. It wasn’t like he’d have time to run back to his penthouse and dig around for the Kevlar under armor he’d kept around for emergencies. And he’d always preferred to be light, anyway.</p><p>His muscles, his physique, his fighting style... they all depended on him being as lightweight as possible. He didn’t have Amenadiel’s bulk to carry ropes and weapons and all types of gear, and frankly, in his opinion, it was better this way.</p><p>He was always better at improvising his way through things. Much like MacGyver if one felt like making a comparison.</p><p>Unfortunately, his time had ran up and he’d been forced to move, forced to fit back into the spy he’d once been.</p><p>Forced to fit into Samael once more.</p><p>And the bad side to Samael was that he’d trusted his brothers once, and that trust was hard to forget without Lucifer there to remind him of it.</p><p>Infiltration had gone smoothly, but then his brothers had opted to split up, which had been stupid and shortsighted and faded to failure in his book, but of course they chose to ignore him and his concerns. </p><p>Lucifer wasn’t really sure why they’d insisted he’d come to the actual mission if they were just going to dismiss him, but even he could see it was possibly the worst moment in his life to argue about that.</p><p>Sam rolled his eyes in response but proceeded to do what he’d been told to, choosing to consciously ignore his idiotic siblings and their simple mindedness for the time being. They were in a mission, the hardest one of them all, and he couldn’t let his thoughts get carried away.</p><p>They’d sent him to the other side of the abandoned factory, across the catwalk that crossed the main open area and led to the top of the abandoned machinery but gave him a view of the main entrance and the side one.</p><p>Amenadiel was to mingle on the shadows and slowly make his way down while Michael would be crossing the mezzanine to wait above the room Command was supposed to be in.</p><p>Sam silently made his way across the catwalk while his brothers moved to their positions, and that put him in a privileged place to witness it all going to hell.</p><p>They knew there was someone with Command, and they knew about the couple demons scarcely guarding the perimeter. But they hadn’t counted on a pair of demons kicking their way through the main doors and striding in like they owned the place, yelling loudly at Command and generally being stupid. And just in time to see Michael assume his position.</p><p>Sam froze, his heartbeats slowing, his breaths growing sparser as he tried to make himself inconspicuous. Not that it would matter, he was well hidden in the shadows, but his body responded automatically, and he could see Amenadiel do the same.</p><p>He was just as well hidden as Sam was, but hadn’t made a single move to better position himself in case they had to interfere.</p><p>Samael let out a breath as he slowly made his way to where he could help Michael if it came to it, and not even that made Amenadiel move. It was this cold calculation that scared him the most, what had scared him since day one. The willingness they had to just put some stupid mission above each other, of always think of the greater good.</p><p>Of not even trying to help when others clearly needed.</p><p>He’d felt it himself, when they’d blown up his apartment, all in the name of what was good for the Family. As if Lucifer had never been a part of it.</p><p>“Hey, what the fuck you doin’ up there?” One of the demons called at Michael, too stupid to even think about reaching for the gun at its waist. </p><p>Its partner didn’t either. They looked low life enough, bottom of the chain enough, for them to not be missed or mourned too much were Michael to take them out. Unfortunately, all the noise they were making wouldn’t go unnoticed by their target.</p><p>Michael remained unmoving, his arms loosely by his sides, his stance relaxed, eyes unfaltering on their two intruders.</p><p>“Yo, I’m talkin’ to you.” The demon said, stepping forward in a futile way to impose itself. It would’ve made Sam laugh, had he not been in this position, with his worst nightmare only a few feet away.</p><p>The door to the room Command was in burst open, a short, bulky man limping through it. “What the hell is going on here?” He demanded, his voice imposing and firm. It made the demons cower under his scrutiny for a second, before their eyes fell back to Michael.</p><p>But the new figure didn’t even get a chance to look at the spy.</p><p>Michael moved in a split second. The gun holstered to his thigh suddenly appearing on his hand as a shot rang out, buffed by the metal walls of the abandoned factory.</p><p>The new man’s body fell to the ground, the back of his skull red with blood and brains leaking from a bullet shaped hole. The thump of the lifeless body hitting the concrete ground was muffled by the imposing silence.</p><p>It took a few seconds for the demons to snap out of it, to reach for their guns and try to stop the shaking in their hands for long enough to shoot. When it seemed like they were ready for it, they received the same treatment as their boss.</p><p>Two bullets to the back of their skulls, curtesy of Amenadiel.</p><p>And all of that before Sam had a chance to move.</p><p>Amenadiel finally started to make his way down and Michael got to the main floor as well to check on their victims. There was no point in hiding now, so Sam got up and mentally traced his path to get down.</p><p>He could either remain up there and act as a surprise third party or get down and help his brothers when Command inevitably left the office. Unsurprisingly, he chose to remain incognito. </p><p>Command wouldn’t be expecting him, not unless the demons he’d shot had talked, which Sam knew they hadn’t. So, it was in their best interest if he remained hidden.</p><p>All three pairs of eyes had their focus on the main office door, waiting for their target to leave, but they hadn’t considered that Command had already left.</p><p>Steps echoed on the metal surface of the catwalk, making Samael flinch in response to each one of them. His heartbeats spiked, a panic rushing to take over him that he could barely keep contained.</p><p>When he turned around, the face of his nightmares stared down his soul and smirked.</p><p>“Well, just look at who we have here!”</p>
<hr/><p>The ground disappeared from beneath his feet.</p><p>A constant pressure at the middle of his chest pushed him backwards, pressing his lower back to the cold railings on the catwalk. Sam lost his balance, the ground disappeared from beneath his feet, but the pressure kept pushing and pushing and pushing, until he was tipped over the railings and swept up by the air.</p><p>He’d tried to grab the metal railings, to hold onto the bridge, to hold onto his life, but it was futile. He was falling and falling…</p><p>Until he wasn’t.</p><p>His body hit the top of an old, rusty machine that creaked and shook with the weight of his impact. Then he was falling again, but this time the metal beneath him fell as well.</p><p>The second impact was stronger than the first as the old machinery went down in a pile of rubble, deformed, rusty, sharp pieces of metal all around him. His scars hit a particularly sharply bent piece, the blinding pain so unbearable Sam thought he’d lost consciousness for a second.</p><p>The fall knocked the air out of his lungs, making him choke on it as he struggled to breathe. The sound of his body hitting the old machine echoed through the factory, even louder for him, booming inside his spinning, out of focus, mind.</p><p>Coughs rattled his body as he tried to move. Sam came to support himself on shaky forearms, spitting out the blood flooding his mouth. </p><p>Shots rang out, bullets recklessly hitting the catwalk and the ceiling and what was left of the old machinery, causing sparks and ricocheting at random. Sam dropped back down in a futile attempt to cover himself, but for once luck was on his side.</p><p>He heard steps running away, weight dropping into metal and eventually hitting the floor, his brothers yelling at each other. More bullets, a struggle. Pained grunts and surprised yelps.</p><p>He had to get up and help, but his mind spun when he tried to, a sickness taking over his stomach, blood running from the back of his skull and down his neck, slick and warm, but that made a chill run down his spine all the same.</p><p>He was useless. Just as he’d been told all his life. Time and time again. He couldn’t even stand up and fight the man who had put him through hell.</p><p>Who had just now thrown him from the catwalk to die…</p><p>Sam had frozen when he heard the steps approaching him, had flinched when he’d heard Command’s voice, had continuously backed away as his torturer approached. He had let the man push him to his death.</p><p>Because the dark had come haunting him again, because the flashbacks were stronger and more frequent and more real than ever. Because he was afraid.</p><p>No more.</p><p>Samael rose to his unsteady feet, willing his heart to calm down with deep breaths. He could do this. He could put an end to his past, stop it from haunting his present. And then he could go back to her and live his future. And he could finally be happy.</p><p>With pained movements and a recurring loss of balance, Sam slowly made his way from the middle of the pile of useless metal to the main area, letting the sounds of the fight guide him.</p><p>He blinked several times, hoping the sickness that had taken over his stomach would just let him be.</p><p>He didn’t have such luck.</p><p>His suit was already torn, bloodied and dirty, he was hurting all over, his head throbbing from what he was almost sure was a concussion... and yet his eyes found focus.</p><p>Not on Michael, who had a red smear of blood all over his cheek, his nose bent unnaturally, and was slightly favoring his left leg. </p><p>Not on Amenadiel, who had used most of his gear already, who was unarmed, who had blood on his hands and a split lip.</p><p>Not even on Command, who somehow found a way to still stand smugly and empoweringly over his siblings, even though he looked just as bad as his brothers did.</p><p>Instead, his eyes focused on a side door, and the couple demons who were supposed to be patrolling the grounds as they barged in.</p><p>Sam ran with a balance he hadn’t had before. All he could do, all he could see, all he could think about was the demon heading for Amenadiel with the knife aimed at is brother.</p><p>He was steady on his feet, his mind clear, his stomach settled, then he crashed into the demon, taking him down to the ground with him in a mix of limbs and punches and yelps. </p><p>Sam felt an elbow connecting with his ribs before he felt a sting at his side as the knife nicked his skin on the way to the ground.</p><p>They hit the floor with a heavy pang, with punches and kicks flying everywhere as the demon tried to get away and grab a hold of the knife it had lost on the fall. It was a mess, and the fall made him dizzy again, made the sickness return, the concussion making him lose his balance and hit his head on the ground again.</p><p>Gladly, he wasn’t on his own.</p><p>Amenadiel was on top of them the next second, fighting the demon for the knife as Sam struggled to stand. All his energy had been burned out by his sprint, all the sickness, all the dizziness, and the infernal pounding in his head returned full force, but thankfully he wasn’t alone.</p><p>Amenadiel was standing between him and the demon, on guard, eyes focused on his opponent wielding the knife. His years of experience bleeding through his pose, the calculated violence oozing out of him strangely comforting. </p><p>Sam shook his head, and tried to focus back on the mission, send the sickness away. They could do this.</p><p>Sure, he was half dead on his feet, concussed and living his worst nightmare. This was all a huge trauma fest that would take too many therapy sessions to get over, but Sam felt confident.</p><p>For the first time since he’d agreed to this half thought out plan, it actually seemed achievable. For the first time it didn’t seem like he’d willingly walked into his own funeral. For the first time it felt like they might actually come out of this on top.</p><p>Alive.</p><p>But then Amenadiel just had to turn around and run to the opposite direction.</p><p>Sam was left just standing there, baffled, frozen as his mind tried to catch up to what had just happened. In his defense, the demon remained still as well, as confused as Sam felt.</p><p>Unfortunately for him, the demon recovered much faster than Sam did. He hastily threw his fists up in a pointless attempt to get on guard as the demon charged towards him.</p><p>Sam tried to deflect the knife and push it away, but his strength was at its lowest, and he hadn’t been expecting the kick to his knee.</p><p>He hit the floor in one knee, this change in balance making him loosen up his grip on the demon’s wrist. It brought the knife dangerously close to his neck, the cool steel nicking his skin and tinging his neck with a tiny spec of red.</p><p>This time he was aware or the knee rising to connect with his stomach, but he couldn’t let go of the knife to stop it.</p><p>It connected straight into his stomach’s mouth, sending a gush of air out of his lungs. He bent forward in reflex as a wave of sickness rose up his throat, bile making his mouth taste bitter.</p><p>His entire body shook, and his grip faltered, making it easy for the demon to free itself from Sam’s grasp. He opened his eyes wide and focused on the knife, intent on facing whatever attack would strike him down with his chin up… but a shot rang loudly in the busy warehouse, and the demon dropped back to the floor before it could move.</p><p>Amenadiel appeared by his side moments later but chose to grab the knife from the dead demon instead of helping a struggling Sam to stand up. </p><p>The same blade that almost killed him was being pushed into his grip not a second later, but Sam was still a bit too shocked, still a bit too out of himself to react properly.</p><p>“Get a grip, Samael! Command’s getting away, come on!” Amenadiel’s command was stern, but a crash just behind him made him stop dead on his tracks.</p><p>Sam turned around to find Michael struggling against a demon, with blood dripping from a slit brow almost covering his eyes. The Devil in him wanted to dish out punishment, to finally face his nightmares and give Command a glimpse of all the terror he’d put Sam through.</p><p>But every time his eyes fell on Michael, it was as if he was gazing upon himself, and that gave him pause.</p><p>Somewhere in the back of his mind, Samael registered the scoff that escaped Amenadiel’s lips as he ran after Command, leaving him to decide for himself. But on the forefront of his mind, all Sam could thing of was how they always chose the mission before each other.</p><p>And how ironical it was that they called themselves a family.</p><p>The demon threw Michael to the side and turned to face him, but Sam had already made up his mind.</p><p>He’d found a family of his own here, where people cared for him because of who he was, where he was free to be himself, to want things for himself. And his family would never leave someone behind.</p><p>So, he’d rise above, if not for Michael, then for the twin he wished he hadn’t lost all those years ago.</p><p>The demon was on him only second later, frantically throwing punches everywhere it could. It was easy enough to dodge the first few, but after a particular low dodge, a wave of sickness rose in his stomach, making him dizzy in the process. It was easy for the demon to overcome him then, and Sam was pushed into a wall, that sore spot in his head cracking right at the cold concrete.</p><p>His legs gave in and black spots danced before his eyes as Samael fell to the ground, trying his best to keep the bile inside his body. He blinked hard for a few seconds, willing the nausea to pass, and when his vision finally found focus, he saw Michael fighting the demon again.</p><p>Sam tried to stand up and go help, but his legs were too wobbly to carry him, and he ended up falling on his knees only a few steps forward, the demon now pinning his twin to the ground, its hands reaching out to strangle the life out of him.</p><p>Sam’s hand moved before he made the decision to do so, and soon enough the sound of the knife skidding through the concrete floor was all he could hear.</p><p>The demon’s eyes widened as it saw the blade stop right at Michael’s hand. But as the silver metal disappeared inside the demon’s side, all Samael could focus on was the grin on his twin’s face.</p><p>Michael carelessly threw the dead body covering him to the side before getting up and making his way to help Sam stand as well. It was the look in his twin’s blue eyes that made him take pause.</p><p>It wasn’t gratitude per say, but it wasn’t not that, either. Samael didn’t think he’d ever seen that look on Michael, but there it was. As clear in his eyes as it was on the hand he offered to help him stand up.</p><p>He could almost feel a tentative smile spreading on his lips, but Amenadiel’s pained grunt cut the understanding the twins were reaching in the middle, and everything went downhill from there.</p><p>Command had thrown his brother at an old container and was stalking forward, gun at the ready to finish his job. Samael felt the panic rising inside him, bubbling up his anxiety into a scream that refused to leave his throat.</p><p>How was he supposed to focus, how was he supposed to keep fighting when every bloody time he felt like he couldn’t win? That no matter the outcome, they were faded to lose.</p><p>He wanted to scream, he wanted to tackle Command, anything to turn the attention away from Amenadiel, but what could he do?</p><p>Samael didn’t have a gun – or the clarity of mind to shoot one –, he didn’t have a knife, he didn’t even have control over his own stomach…</p><p>But Michael had a gun, and he raised it maybe a second too late.</p><p>When his twin finally moved, Command had already noticed them, had noticed the gun about to be pointed at him, and pointed his at Michael, instead.</p><p>The glinting eyes of his worst nightmare briefly settled on him. Samael’s panic shot to overdrive in a split second, and he thought his heart would explode right out of his chest… but Command turned his eyes to Michael again.</p><p>And fired.</p><p>That was when Sam felt the tight grip on his wrist that sent him moving.</p><p>The smell of gunpowder filled the warehouse before he even heard the explosion. And then the bullet hit him, pierced the skin of his back, sending a pain so blinding through his core that he fell limply to the ground.</p><p>Sam could feel the blood pouring out of him through the newfound hole in his person, he could feel his hands shaking, his muscles twitching around the foreign object that penetrated his body, but he couldn’t tear his eyes away from Michael.</p><p>Lucifer watched as his twin, a mirror image of himself, raised his gun and shot, before completely disappearing from his eyesight without even looking down at him.</p><p>Tears filled his eyes, drowning whatever was left of his sight in an ocean of pain. The fatal sound of the shot rang in his ears, booming inside his skull, but he couldn’t feel the headache it would normally cause. He couldn’t feel his body shaking anymore, and slowly, even the pain went away.</p><p>But not the feeling of the blood being drained out of him, taking his life along with it. It pooled around him, caking his shirt and making it stick uncomfortably to his skin. That was the only thought that drifted around his mind, until even that disappeared.</p><p>Lucifer couldn’t quite feel anything anymore, just this cold that was closing in on him, seeping into his bones and reaching even the deepest parts of his soul.</p><p>As he laid there, dying, struggling to draw breath, regret filled his being, but he refused to let it conquer the warmth that had settled in his heart. All because of her…</p><p>Her image was blurred by his tears, but she would always be beautiful to him. His Detective… And how Lucifer wished he could’ve done things so much more differently!</p><p>He wished he could’ve made her as happy as she made him, or at least had given himself the chance to try. She’d always been gentle to him, nothing but caring and accepting, even after he’d told her about his past. Chloe had always been his sun, filling his soul with warmth, and calmness, and light.</p><p>She made him want to be good, and she would have <em>never</em> done this to him.</p><p>Lucifer should’ve listened to all the bloody senses and feelings he had and stayed by her side.</p><p>But at least the threat to her life would be over now. Even if that threat had been him in the first place.</p><p>He barely recognized the sound of footsteps approaching him until Michael and Amenadiel appeared in his field of vision, both looking worse for wear, but nowhere near as bad as he did.</p><p>There was a somberness to their eyes, a slump on their shoulders, on Amenadiel’s more so than Michael’s, but they didn’t move a muscle as he convulsed on the ground, rattled with pain.</p><p>In a last futile bout of hope, Sam thought that they might try to help him, but deep down, Lucifer knew this was the best outcome they could’ve ever bargained for. Two monsters, one shot.</p><p>Both spies just stood there, regarding him, with barely any emotion in their eyes anymore, until eventually Michael turned away and left.</p><p>“I’m- I’m so sorry, Sam. I wish I could help, but-” Amenadiel looked sorry enough that Samael might have believed him, but Lucifer knew that was just him trying to convince them both that Lucifer being shot couldn’t possibly be his fault. Amenadiel never thought anything that happened wrong could ever be his fault. “You were a part of the mission as well.” He tried to justify it to himself, resolve steeling in his eyes as he forced himself to turn around to walk away.</p><p>“My name… is <em>Lucifer</em>.” He spat, the taste of blood in his mouth making it hard for him to talk. </p><p>His life had killed him, but at least he’d die with his own name.</p><p>Amenadiel’s impassive eyes settled on his one last time before he walked away from him for the last time, his steps echoing in the overtly silent factory.</p><p>Blood started to fill his mouth, tinging the corners of his lips and making Lucifer choke on it. The cold was seeping through him to the deepest parts of his being, and he tried to think about her instead, about her warmth and the beach… but this <em>cold</em>, it was impossible to run from.</p><p>The blur in his vision only got worse and worse until he could barely see the ceiling above his head. At least he could pretend the blackening in his slugging consciousness was the night sky as he tried in vain to search for the stars.</p><p>And as much as it <em>sucked</em> dying right then, Lucifer wouldn’t change his life.</p><p>Not when it had brought him to her.</p><p>The darkness consuming his mind slowly started to be flooded by silky, golden strands and soft, ocean eyes, until Lucifer thought he could hear her, and he could almost see her… but maybe it was just his wishful thinking.</p><p>Unfortunately, he didn’t have the time to find out as his world was plunged in an all-encompassing darkness.</p>
<hr/><p>His rise from unconsciousness was slow, but the sharp panging in the back of his skull accompanied Lucifer all the way. The darkness that surrounded his being began to fade away slowly, until he wasn’t drifting in the void anymore.</p><p>He felt a soft pressure growing beneath his body, comfortable and unhurried. It was calm, and peaceful, but the lingering tension in his muscles brought back that first instinct to fight.</p><p>His eyes startled open and he was blinded by light.</p><p>Pain flared in his brain, going as far as the deepest confines of his soul, and a brief panic bubbled up inside him. But despite the agony of uncertainty, Lucifer could feel a gentle breeze sweeping over his being, softly caressing his feverish skin, and he let out a relieved breath.</p><p>Brief, dark flashes and crashing metal sounds and pain and screams and betrayal accompanied him, but Lucifer could almost hear the sound of the waves in the distance. A calmness set over his body, taking all traces of a fight away from him, to the very back of his mind where they couldn’t plague him in the moment.</p><p>For a second, he thought he was in Heaven.</p><p>Lucifer knew it was a foolish thing. He was most certainly destined for Hell – if the place even existed –, but he couldn’t quite explain whatever it was that had taken over his being. This unbounded peace that kept on lifting him higher and higher, further up than the clouds could ever reach. </p><p>The sound of someone letting out a deep breath graced his ears, and it made him realize he must not be dead after all.</p><p>The thought was equally terrifying and the single best thing that had ever happened to him.</p><p>Despite the brightness, his eyes opened with ease the second time around. White assaulted his senses from the ceiling above to the surface he was laying on, and kicking that idea of Heaven out of his mind the second time around was particularly harder.</p><p>But there was this sense of familiarity that surrounded him, this soft weight that settled in his chest that only one place in the entire Earth could spur.</p><p>Lucifer took in a deep breath and he could smell the moist sand and the sharp salt in the air, and there was just this faint scent of lavender coming from the pillow by his side. But it was barely there, just a hint, and Lucifer thought he might have imagined it.</p><p>He let out a comforting breath, taking in the simplicity and the calmness of waking up in the master bedroom of his beach house.</p><p>A heaviness weighted his limbs back into the soft mattress, and Lucifer felt as if he’d been out for days. The lingering tension and adrenaline in his muscles was turning into fatigue and pain, and it was tempting to just close his eyes and surrender his consciousness to the easy forgetfulness of oblivion.</p><p>Slowly, Lucifer turned his head to the side, enthralled by the way the white curtains flowed along with the wind as it swept in through the open balcony doors. But in the midst of all the gentle fabric, his eyes found her. Standing outside, leaning on the railing, just as perfect as she’d ever been.</p><p>The orange tone taking over the sky colored her beautifully. </p><p>He was content to simply lay there and watch her, admire her, until the pull to be near her was impossible for him to resist.</p><p>Even thinking about moving hurt, but somehow, Lucifer managed to push through it and bring himself to sit, a hand bracing his ribs all along.</p><p>The rough, raw texture of the bandages prickled his palm as he pressed down on his ribs, hoping it would lessen the pain. Unfortunately, it only spurred a monumental headache that made him lose sight of himself for a moment.</p><p>Brief flashes of the dark warehouse assaulted his mind when he closed his eyes, but Lucifer pushed them out with every little ounce of energy he had left. Back into that lost corner of his mind where his past should have never crawled out of.</p><p>His steps were short and tiring, but it was easy enough to cross the wall of flying curtains and step into the golden sun. Its light banishing the paleness from his skin as he waked further into the balcony.</p><p>Lucifer leaned on the railings by her side, watching the sun making its descend towards the water, slow and beautiful in its delicacy. But soon enough his eyes found her again, and while the Detective didn’t return his look, she ended the space between them.</p><p>Her head came to rest on his shoulder, one of her arms sneaking around his to tangle them together, a low, calming breath escaping her lips.</p><p>Lucifer, for his part, rested his nose on the crown of her head, breathing in that calming lavender scent he’d felt before as he placed a brief kiss to her hair.</p><p>“I’m sorry…” His words were weak and filled with regret, easily lost in the wind, but he knew she’d heard him.</p><p>At this point, Lucifer didn’t even know what he was apologizing for anymore. His brothers, his past… all the hurt he’d caused her… Leaving her behind in the middle of the night being just his latest mistake.</p><p>In the end, he didn’t have to explain. She’d heard him, and she understood him. She always had.</p><p>“I’m sorry, too.”</p><p>He didn’t know what she was apologizing for, but he didn’t need to ask. They’d both been hurt too much, be it from the past, from life… from each other…</p><p>They both had been broken down by life, each in their own way. And he’d learned enough – she’d taught him enough – to know that, sometimes, there didn’t need to be a thing to apologize for.</p><p>He’d learned that actions mattered just as much as words, and sometimes the silence could be more meaningful than mindless explanations and excuses.</p><p>His eyes fell shut as Lucifer let the sound of the water fill him, feeling the waves crashing in on him, surrounding his ankles and washing them both clean from the terrors of the past.</p><p>His cheek fell to rest on her head, and for a minute, everything was simple again.</p><p>His eyes got lost on the wine-colored ocean as he tried to find the balance his voice needed. “How…” He tried, but words failed him as a fresh wave of pain spread through his being, starting at his back.</p><p>“…are you still alive?” The Detective asked, her own voice small, though the tremble in her tone was not lost on the wind. As she finally turned to face him, Lucifer was let into all the guarded relief barely visible in her blue eyes. “Maze called some MacGyver guy. Dr. Rush, I think. Linda helped him patch you up.”</p><p>The relief in her eyes slowly started to spread, taking over her soul until a smile began tugging at the corner of her lips, and a lightheartedness swept over his being for the first time in years.</p><p>“You know, for someone who keeps insisting she’s not this type of doctor, she did a really good job.”</p><p>Lucifer let out an unexpected laugh, causing the stitches on his wounded back to stretch. It had him hissing in pain as he tried – and failed – to hide it. The Detective completely pulled away from him, and it left him missing her warmth immediately. Her hand reached out to rest on his bicep, and Lucifer began feeling light again. He offered her a tight-lipped smile in return as her thumb started moving in circles.</p><p>“How did you find me?” He asked, more in a futile attempt to make her forget this sudden burst of pain than in a sense of curiosity. In all honesty, Lucifer would rather forget about that entire ordeal.</p><p>A bothered gleam began taking over her eyes, but soon enough it was banished away by a smirk that was slowly taking over her features.</p><p>“Well, I might not be a spy, but I still got some tricks up my sleeve.”</p><p>Her snarky response got him a smirk to mirror hers. He knew it was no way the same as the connections he had, and that was what made it so special. But the mirth in her eyes told him everything he needed to know. She’d probably gotten Maze to tell her, somehow, and he couldn’t even be angry at the former demon for it.</p><p>At first, his gaze was filled with humor, but the longer his eyes stayed on her, the harder it was to look away… and the words spilled out of his soul before he could stop them.</p><p>“Thank you.”</p><p>Her brows wrinkled, making her look strangely lovely in her confusion. “What for?”</p><p>The words burned the inside of his throat in an attempt to escape, pressuring his breastbone in their want to burst out of him. It took Lucifer seconds, long seconds where all he did was stare deeply into her stormy, ocean blue eyes, feeling the wind caressing his skin and her warmth so close to his heart, to gather whatever scraps of courage he had and open his lips to let the words be free.</p><p>“For not giving up on me. For not abandoning me, for- for… for me.” He choked out, his eyes immediately falling to the sea in a desperate search for strength or comfort or- he didn’t even know anymore. All he knew was her gaze, and it carried so much meaning he couldn’t even start to interpret.</p><p>Her thumb continued rubbing circles on his arm, and slowly, Lucifer felt the Detective’s presence warming up beside him, gaining in strength and meaning, even when he felt too weak himself to look at her. And then it hit him, far stronger than the waves could hit the shore, how stupid it was of him to need some immensurable body of water to give him strength when she’d been by his side all along.</p><p>His focus immediately rose in search of hers, his eyes as soft as they’d ever been before. “Thank you for seeing me, the real me.”</p><p>And the more he looked, the easier it was for Lucifer to recognize that same softness he felt inside in her eyes, and on the way his Detective shifted to press herself impossibly closer to him. But the fire that suddenly started to take over her gaze put all of that in the backseat. </p><p>Lucifer had always loved it, to watch her burn brighter than the sun, but it was usually directed at criminals. It was quite disconcerting when it was directed at him, and he found himself trapped between being turned on or being cowed about it.</p><p>“It was stupid, what you did. <em>So</em> stupid…” The Detective let out in a breath, her fire bleeding into her words, but then she sighed and it was all gone. Her hand started running up and down his arm, her touch reassuring her he was really there. Her eyes locked on his, and even if Lucifer wanted to, he could never look away from her. “But you have to know I’ll always find you.”</p><p>Her arms slowly went around him, setting low on his waist. He was a bit too stunned to move at first, afraid she’d made a mistake or afraid it might make her realize she didn’t want to be hugging him in the first place. Afraid to scare her away.</p><p>But when moments stretched on and she didn’t retreat… Lucifer couldn’t stop himself from placing his own arms around her and pulling her closer before pressing a featherlight kiss to her head, where it was resting on his chest.</p><p>“This is not and invitation for you to continue to be stupid, though.” An unexpected laugh escaped his lips, and he could feel her mirth vibrating through him from where she was leaning on him. Reluctantly, she pulled away to watch him, her chin resting on his chest, her arms still wrapped around his waist. “Are you okay?” The Detective asked quietly, her hand reaching up to cup his jaw with a delicacy he didn’t deserve.</p><p>It took Lucifer a moment, but with everything that had happened in the past few days with her accident, his brothers reappearing, Maze’s betrayal, Command… his recent injuries just the latest on the mess that was his life…</p><p>How could he be?</p><p>“No. I- I don’t think that I am.” He replied softly with a light shake of his head, his voice a little bit broken, a little bit sad, a little bit afraid.</p><p>“Maybe that’s okay.” She offered, her blue eyes shining with infinite care and support. Her thumb started to caress his cheek, so soft in contrast to the roughness of his stubble that Lucifer couldn’t keep his smile at bay.</p><p>Maybe it was okay, but only time could be certain of that.</p><p>And maybe Dr. Linda. She always knew what to say to him, how to calm his storm, how to make him focus through a beach. Maybe she could calm this anxiety, too.</p><p>And maybe so could Chloe. She certainly knew much more about life than he did, and she knew so much about him it scared him sometimes. And while she may not know all of him, all of his story, his past mistakes, his flaws… she certainly knew him, the <em>real</em> him, the one that mattered.</p><p>Sometimes, she knew him better than he knew himself.</p><p>And Lucifer knew she was far from perfect. She’d made mistakes as well. She’d hurt him in the past… but despite some shortcomings, she had never been anything but kind to him, even when he most certainly didn’t deserve it.</p><p>Even if he still though he didn’t.</p><p>“You can leave your past behind now. Start moving forwards.” He heard her words, he understood them, and he knew that the uplifting tune in her voice was hope, but all her speech managed to spur inside him was that ugly void that had filled his being for much too long. “What is it?”</p><p>The Detective’s expression morphed into concern in a split second, and in reluctance, Lucifer let her pull away. Her eyes were insistent on his and he regretted how clear his self-hatred must be evident in his features in that moment.</p><p>He could feel it uncomfortably weighting in on his chest, hatred mixing in with regret, just waiting to overflow out of him and make him suffocate in it.</p><p>“I’m afraid I’ve caused far too much harm to escape the inevitability of the disaster that I am.” Lucifer’s voice was small as he was afraid that simply saying out loud what had been eating him up for so, so long would somehow make it even more painfully real. Afraid that naming the monster that he carried inside would give it the power to overthrow himself. But even in all his haze of mistrust, one thing had always been certain, had always been bright. “I- I can’t take you down with me. You’re much too important to me, Chloe.”</p><p>Lucifer could feel the shudder than ran through her, could hear the gasp that escaped her lips, could see the wide surprise blatantly clear in her blue eyes. But her shock at his open admittance -because she knew he cared; she’s known all along – was quickly overtaken with trust and care, and a kindness that far surpassed what he deserved.</p><p>“You’re not a disaster, Lucifer.” The Detective’s voice was soft, softer than the breeze that brushed past them, and her words held so much more power than the crashing ocean waves. The hand that had been cupping his cheek dropped to rest on his chest, just above his heart. “It’s true, you’ve made mistakes. But haven’t we all?”</p><p>“I’m afraid I’m just too far gone to turn back now…” His tone was so low, so broken, so filled with vulnerability, that he could barely hear it over his own grief.</p><p>“Hey.” She called for him, ducking down to search his eyes when he refused to meet hers. The hand covering his heart rose to push the stranded curls away from his forehead, and Lucifer let out a breath, feeling that peace take over him again. “No one’s perfect, not even me.”</p><p>He opened his eyes, not realizing he’d closed them, to be met with so much certainty in her gaze that he wished he could believe her. But it had never been that simple, never been that easy with him before, had it?</p><p>So, Lucifer pulled away from her, physically removing the monster that he was from her presence, away from her touch, as far as he could… even if that was the last think he’d ever wanted.</p><p>So much for leaving his past behind…</p><p>He leaned heavily on the balustrade, feeling his anxiety overflowing inside him. He couldn’t keep himself from fumbling with his ring, and his hands often found themselves messing up his hair. When Lucifer finally looked up at his Detective with regret shining in his eyes, he couldn’t quite read the look she gave him back.</p><p>It was pity, he knew, but it was something along the lines. It was close to how she looked at him when he didn’t understand the simple things, when life got him confused, when some detail about his past slipped from his tongue.</p><p>“I’ve killed people, too, you know. Unfortunately, it’s part of the job we do.” Her words rang clear in the afternoon air, but the unsettled something inside him. </p><p>Lucifer was ready to protest it, but the Detective took a sudden step forward, her hand reaching out to his forearm, and although he wanted to push her away, he couldn’t. </p><p>He’d never been strong enough to resist her.</p><p>“I’m not saying that what we went through is the same, but I get it. At least a little.”</p><p>“I…” Lucifer tried to form words, to say something, anything… but his voice refused to work, until he didn’t even know what he’d wanted to say anymore.</p><p>Her eyes stayed kind as she regarded him, her hand reaching up to get tangled on the short hairs at his nape.</p><p>“I…” Lucifer let out with a heavy sigh. Deep down he knew what he needed to say to make her understand, but putting out the worst of himself out in the world still hurt.</p><p>He was still waiting for the Detective to run at any moment, for the other shoe to drop. It always did with him. He knew she couldn’t possibly want to keep being near him when she knew so much already, but she’s proved him wrong so many times before that Lucifer couldn’t help but hope.</p><p>“It felt good, putting those demons down at the warehouse. I <em>enjoyed</em> it, and I’ve-” The words got stuck inside him, rasping his throat raw as he struggled to either swallow them back into the darkness that filled him or let them out. He didn’t even know anymore.</p><p>Lucifer’s eyes were wide as he regarded her in his futile attempt to watch her leave him with his head held high, but, as always, the detective surprised him, choosing to remain impassive by his side. His broken heart fluttered with hope for a foolish second, despite all the hatred he still felt inside himself.</p><p>“How is that okay… How… I-” Lucifer gulped down his words, the thickness in his voice getting stuck in his throat as he looked away, unable to face the tears that had started to fill her eyes.</p><p>The dichotomy of his being would rip him apart someday.</p><p>“I know.” Her voice, small and fragile, attracted his eyes like a magnet. Lucifer didn’t understand her, <em>couldn’t</em> understand her, but the Detective swallowed her tears and soldiered on, her conflict so much like his own. “I didn’t have to kill Malcolm, you know. I… He- He was trying to hurt Trixie and- and he’d hurt you, so… I- <em>I know</em>.”</p><p>Both her hands reached out to him, settling on his chest, so cold despite the warm climate. Her fingers would caress him occasionally, her nails softly scraping his chest, and Lucifer couldn’t help it. His hands reached out to her waist almost instinctively, pulling her closer to him because he’d never been able to stay away.</p><p>“When it comes to us, you’ve made mistakes and you’ve hurt me…” The Detective said softly, and he couldn’t stop being ashamed of his past mistakes, of everything he’d ever done to push her away. But as it was, she didn’t seem to be having any of it. </p><p>Her hands to cup his cheeks, softly encouraging to lift his face and meet her eyes, and Lucifer was surprised to find a soft smile gracing her features.”</p><p>“… but your heart was always <em>mostly</em> in the right place.”</p><p>He let out a snort that made his ribs expand and contract a bit too quickly for his comfort. It made his stiches pull uncomfortably, but nothing could distract him from her at that moment. Nothing could distract him from the smile that had broken through her pain and settled on her face, much like the sun breaks through stormy clouds to shine.</p><p>“If you think that after all this time, after all we’ve been through… If you think I don’t know you, the <em>real</em> you and not the monster your family made you believe you are… then <em>you’re wrong.</em>"</p><p>“You’re <em>good</em>, Lucifer.” She said with so much conviction, her voice caring so much hope and certainty, that he couldn’t bring himself to protest. Lucifer simply closed his eyes as she ran her hands through his curls, and he couldn’t help but desperately believe that she was right. “You may stumble along the way, but your heart has always been in the right place."</p><p>Her fingers carded deeper into the hear at the back of his neck as she slowly encouraged him to lower his head, resting her forehead on his. “We can’t change our past, we can’t control the things that are done to us… but we can control how we react to them. And going backwards, it isn’t good for anyone.”</p><p>“What do you say we move forwards now?” Chloe asked, her voice so low and vulnerable, but he couldn’t have said it better himself.</p><p>And Lucifer wanted it, he’s always wanted it. To move forward, to be with her, to be <em>hers</em> in a way he’d never allowed himself to be with anyone else. And he knew what he needed.</p><p>He knew what they deserved, after all this time, all the misunderstandings, all the hurt.</p><p>Ever so slowly, Lucifer leaned down, brushing his nose alongside her and making a smile take over them both. He barely brushed his lips to hers before Chloe reached out and kissed him with all the softness and the care he didn’t deserve but would gladly take like the greedy, selfish man that he was.</p><p>With her hands deep in his hair and holding his heart next to her own, she held him close, and if it was up to him, he’d never be anywhere else.</p><p>Smiles began to take over them, a peace so complete that he’d never felt before, until it was impossible to keep kissing her, but Lucifer was still glad to feel the evidence of her happiness in his skin.
</p><p>“I’d like that."</p><p>He’d always known she was his future. Now, he was finally free to be happy.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Did you notice ow Lucifer kept changing his name throughout the story? I made it that way so it shows how he's seeing himself, what mindset he has on and how it changes how he behaves. And he only ever uses Chloe's name in the end when he finally decides to let himself open up to her. I hope it was easy to notice and understand ;p</p><p>This is my last prompt on my bingo card and it's so late, but I couldn't be more satisfied at how this challenge turned out. I hope you all enjoyed it!</p><p>Thank you all for reading &lt;3<br/>Comments and kudos highly appreciated.</p><p>You can find me on tumblr as <a href="thiefintheshadowsyothiefintheshadowsyo.tumblr.com"> @thiefintheshadowsyo </a><br/>Come by say hi!</p></blockquote></div></div>
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